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INFORMATION SERIES 



April, 1918 



THE STUDY OF 



THE GREAT WAR 

A TOPICAL OUTLINE, WITH EXTENSIVE 
QUOTATIONS AND READING REFERENCES 




By 
SAMUEL B. HARDING 

Professor of European History in Indiana University 



ISSUED BY 

THE COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC INFORMATION 

WASHINGTON, D. C. 



fleeted set 



MO ^ 
PUBLICATIONS OF THE COMMITTEE^ 

Titles marked with a star (*) are of especial value in the study of the war and are frequently 
referred to in this outline. 

I. RED WHITE AND BLUE SERIES 

List No. 
♦How the War Came to America. 32 pages. (Translations into German, Polish, 

Bohemian, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Portuguese and Yiddish ....... No. 1 

National Service Handbook. 246 pages. (15 cents.) No. 2 

The Battle Line of Democracy. A collection of patriotic prose and poetry. 134 

pages. (15 cents.) ■ No. 3 

*The President's Flag Day Address, with Evidence of Germany's Plans. 32 pages. No. 4 
♦Conquest and Kultur. Quotations from German writers revealing the plans and 

purposes of pan-Germany. 160 pages . No. 5 

♦German War Practices: Part I — Treatment of Civilians. By Dana C. Munro and 

others. 91 pages No. 6 

♦War Cyclopedia: A Handbook for Ready Reference on the Great War. By F. L. 

Paxson, E. S. Corwin, and S. B. Harding. 321 pages. (25 cents.) .... No. 7 
♦German Treatment of Conquered Territory: Part II of "German War Practices." 

By Dana C. Munro and others. 61 pages No. 8 

♦War, Labor, and Peace: Some Recent Addresses and Writings of the President. 

American Reply to the Pope; Address to the American Federation of Labor; Mes- 
sages to Congress of Dec. 4, 1917, Jan. 8, and Feb. 11, 1918._ 48 pages No. 9 

*German Plots and Intrigues: Activities of the German System in the United States 

during the Period of Our Neutrality. By E. E. Sperry and W. M. West. 

(In press) ■ No. 10 

II. WAR INFORMATION SERIES 

*The War Message and the Facts Behind It. 32 pages No. 101 

The Nation in Arms. Two addresses by Secretaries Lane and Baker. 16 pages . . No. 102 

*The Government of Germanv. By Charles D. Hazen. 16 pages No. 103 

*The Great War: From Spectator to Participant. By A. C. McLaughlin. 16 pages. No. 104 
A War of Self-Defense . Addresses by Secretary of State Lansing and Assistant Secre- 
tary of Labor Post. 22 pages No. 105 

American Loyalty. By American citizens of German descent. 24 pages .... No. 106 

Amerikanische Biirgertreue. German translation of No. 106 No. 107 

American Interest in Popular Government Abroad. By E. B. Greene. 16 pages . No. 108 
Home Reading Course for Citizen Soldiers. Prepared by the War Department. 

62 pages No. 109 

First Session of the War Congress. Complete summary of all legislation. 48 pages. No. 1 10 

*The German War Code. By G. W. Scott and J. W. Garner. 16 pages .... No. Ill 

♦American and Allied Ideals. By Stuart P. Sherman. 24 pages No. 112 

♦German Militarism and Its German Critics. By Charles Altschul. 48 pages . . No. 113 
The War for Peace. Views of American Peace organizations and leaders in the 

present war. Bv Arthur D. Call. 48 pages No. 114 

♦Why America Fights Germany. By John S. P. Tatlock. _ 13 pages No. 115 

♦The Study of the Great War: A topical outline with extensive quotations and read- 
ing references. By Samuel B. Harding. 96 pages _ . No. 116 

The Activities of the Committee on Public Information. By George Creel, Chair- 
man of the committee No. 117 

III. LOYALTY LEAFLETS 

Friendly Words to the Foreign Born. By Judge Joseph Burlington. (Translations 

into the principal foreign languages are in preparation.) No. 201 

♦The Prussian System. By F. C. Walcott, of the United States Food Administration. No. 202 
♦Labor and the War. President Wilson's Address to the American Federation of 

Labor, November 12, 1917 No. 203 

A War Message to the Farmer. By President Wilson No. 204 

♦Plain Issues of the War. By Elihu Root, Ex-Secretary of State No. 205 

Ways to Serve the Nation. A Proclamation by President Wilson No. 206 

What Really Matters. By a well-known newspaper writer No. 207 

IV. OFFICIAL BULLETIN. (Published daily; price $5 per year.) 
The above publications are distributed free, except as noted. Address — 

COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC INFORMATION 
10 Jackson Place, Washington, D. C. 

2 






NOV 19 igSsS 



Contents 

Page 
Chapter I. Fundamental Causes of the War 5 

I. General Factors. II. Militarism and Armaments. III. Failure of the Haeue 
Conferences of 1899 and 1907, and of the Naval Conference of London (1908-9) 
IV. borne Special Subjects of International Conflict. V. Summary and Conclusion ' 
VI. Reading References. 

Chapter II. Historical Background of the War 13 

I. Foundation and Character of the Present German Empire. II The Triple 
Alliance and the Triple Entente. III. Three Diplomatic Crises, 1905, 1908 1911 
IV. Bagdad Railway and the "Mittel-Europa" Project. V. Tripolitan and Balkan 
Wars, 1911-13. VI. Reading References. 

Chapter III. Indications that Germany and Austria Planned an 
Aggressive Stroke 19 

I. Austria Proposed an Attack on Serbia in 1913. II. Secret Military Report on 
Strengthening the German Army (March 19, 1913). III. Changed Attitude of 
the Kaiser; Interview with King Albert of Belgium (November, 1913). IV. German 
£lVvJ 5 C i? lnl 1 ? n as ^Ported by French Diplomatic and Consular Agents (July 30 
in!?}" tW Extraordinary Military Measures of Germany (taken before June 28 
1914). VI. Conclusion. VII. Reading References. 

Chapter IV. The Austro-Serbian Controversy 29 

I. Introduction: Prior Relations of Serbia, Austria, and Russia. II. The Seraievo 
Assassination (June 28 1914). III. Austrian Note to Serbia (July 23, 1914) 
IV. Serbian Reply to the Austrian Note (July 25, 1914). V. Austria Declares 
War on Serbia (July 28, 1914). VI. Conclusions. VII. Reading References! 

Chapter V. Failure of Diplomacy to Avert War : Germany and Austria 
at War with Russia and France 35 

I. Outline of Events, July 21 to August 6, 1914. II. Proposals for Preserving 
Peace. Ill German Ultimatums and Declarations of War Against Russia and 
France. IV. German Responsibility for the War. V. Reading References. 

Chapter VI. Violation of Belgium's Neutrality Brings in Great Britain . 42 

k^ ¥ Gr T e T a T B M ita i Q ^T aa Ex T P ected t° Stay Out. II. British Diplomacy and 
the War III. Neutrality of Luxemburg and of Belgium Violated. IV Great 
Britain Enters the War. V. Reading References. 

Chapter VII. The War Spreads : Character of the War 52 

I. Other States Enter the War II. World-wide Character and Importance of the 
Conflict. Ill . Innovations in Warfare Due to the Progress of Science and Invention 

IV. Examples of German Ruthlessness and Violations of International Law' 

V. Summary and Explanation of German Policy. VI. Reading References." 

Chapter VIII. The United States Enters the War 64 

no^Tff le to T M g intain Our Neutrality (1914-16). II. From Neutrality to War 
\-,?V?.. 7) - IIJ ^ Summ ary of Our Reasons for Entering the War IV Dutv of 
All Citizens to Support the War Wholeheartedly. V. Reading References. 

Chapter IX. Course of the War, 1914-18 74 

I.. Campaign of 1914. II. Campaign of 1915. III. Campaign of 1916. IV. Cam- 
paign of 1917. V. Campaign of 1918 (to April 3). VI. Reading References. 

Chapter X. Proposals for Peace : Will This Be the Last War? .... 83 

I. Summary of 23 States at War in 19 17. II. American Aims in the War III Various 
V^Win^Ri 3 ;^!- ?o ali Tw ^Central Powers with Russia and Roumania! 
V. Will this Be the Last Great War? VI. Reading References 

3 



This topical outline was prepared for the Committee on 
Public Information; it received a preliminary publication 
in the History Teacher's Magazine for January, 1918. The 
author wishes to acknowledge the active co-operation of the 
National Board for Historical Service in its preparation, 
and also to express his indebtedness to a syllabus prepared 
by Dr. E. M. Linton of Indiana University. Numerous 
friends and associates gave aid and helpful suggestions. 



The Study of the Great War 

I. FUNDAMENTAL CAUSES OF THE WAR 
I. General Factors 

1. The constitution of the German Empire permits its foreign policy to be 

determined by the Emperor alone, who is at the same time, by "divine 
right," King of Prussia — the State which possesses an overwhelming 
territorial, political, and military predominance in the Empire. 

"The Emperor declares war with the consent of the Bundesrat, the 
assent of the Reichstag not being required. Not even the Bundesrat 
need be consulted if the war is defensive, and as the Hohenzollerns have 
always claimed to make defensive warfare it is not surprising that even 
the unrepresentative Bundesrat was officially informed about the present 
war three days after the Emperor declared it." — (Charles D. Hazen, 
The Government of Germany, Committee on Public Information publica- 
tion. See 'also War Cyclopedia, under 'Autocracy,' 'Kaiserism,' 'William 
II.') 

2. Profit derived from war in the past by Prussia (Germany). 

(a) Through increase of territory (cf. maps). ' 

(b) Through indemnities (e.g., from France, 1871). 

(c) Through increased prestige and influence. Hence justification of 
the "blood and iron" policy of Bismarck and his predecessors. War 
as "the national industry" of Prussia. 

"The Great Elector laid the foundations of Prussia's power by success- 
ful and deliberately incurred wars. Frederick the Great followed in 
the footsteps of his glorious ancestor. . . . None of the wars which 
he fought had been forced upon him; none of them did he postpone as 
long as possible. . . . The lessons of history thus confirm the view 
that wars which have been deliberately provoked by far-seeing statesmen 
have had the happiest results. " : — (Bernhardi, Germany and the Next 
War, 1911.) 

3. Germany's demand for "a place in the sun." 

(a) Meaning of the Kaiser's phrase ("a place in the sun") not clear. It 
covers vaguely colonies, commerce, and influence in international 
affairs in proportion to Germany's population, industrial importance, 
and military power. 

(b) Obstacles. The German Empire was a late-comer in the family of 
nations; the best regions for colonization and exploitation, especially 
in the temperate zones, were already occupied by other Powers. 

5 



6 THE GREAT WAR 

(c) Examples of the demand. — (See Conquest and Kultur, sees. 6, 10; 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Place in the Sun/ 'Pan-Germanism,' etc.) 

"We need colonies, and more colonies, than we have already to give 
vent to our surplus energies without losing them and to make the mother- 
land economically independent." — (Manifesto of the Colonial League.) 

"We need a fleet strong enough not only to protect the colonies we now 
have, but to bring about the acquisition of others." — (Manifesto of the 
Navy League.) 

"A progressive nation like ours needs territory, and if this cannot be 
obtained by peaceful means, it must be obtained b,y war. It is the object 
of the Defense Association [Wehrverein] to create this sentiment." — 
(Lieut. -General Wrochem in speech to the Wehrverein in March, 1913.) 

"Without doubt this acquisition of new lands will not take place without 
war. What world power was ever established without bloody struggles?" 
— (Albrecht Wirth, Volkstum und Welimacht in der Geschichte, 1904. 
Quoted by Andler, Le Pangermanisme continental, 1915, p. 308.) 

"It is only by relying on our good German sword that we can hope to 
conquer that place in the sun which rightly belongs to us, and which 
no one will yield to us voluntarily. . . . Till the world comes to 
an end, the ultimate decision must rest with the sword." — (German 
Crown Prince, in Introduction to Germany in Arms, 1913.) 

4. Biological argument for war. 

(a) Darwin's theory of the "struggle for existence" as a chief factor in 
the evolution of species. 

(b) Development in Germany of the theory that States are of necessity 
engaged in such a "struggle for existence." 

(c) Hence war is an "ordinance of God for the weeding out of weak and 
incompetent individuals and States." Corollary: "Might makes 
right." 

(d) Examples of such arguments from Treitschke, Bernhardi, etc. — (See 
Conquest and Kultur, sec. 1, 2, 4; War Cyclopedia, under 'Bernhardi,' 
'Treitschke/ 'War, German View'; Vernon Kellogg, 'Headquarters' 
Nights/ in Atlantic Monthly for August, 1917.) 

"War is a biological necessity of the first importance, a regulative ele- 
ment in the life of mankind which cannot be dispensed with, since without it 
an unhealthy development will follow, which excludes every advancement 
of the race, and therefore all real civilization. . . . 'To supplant 
or be supplanted is the essence of life/ says Goethe, and the strong life 
gains the upper hand. The law of the stronger holds good everywhere. 
Those forms survive which are able to procure themselves the most favor- 
able conditions of life , and to assert themselves in the universal economy of 
Nature. The weaker succumb. . . . 

"Might gives the right to occupy or to conquer. Might is at once the 
supreme right, and the dispute as to what is right is decided by the arbitra- 
ment of war." — (Bernhardi, Germany and the Next War, 1911, pp. 18, 23.) 



FUNDAMENTAL CAUSES 7 

"They fight, not simply because they are forced to, but because, 
curiously enough, they believe much of their talk. That is one of the 
dangers of the Germans to which the world is exposed; they really 
believe much of what they say." — (Vernon Kellogg, in Atlantic Monthly, 
August, 1917.) 
Idea of the German mission in the world, and the German demand for 
world influence and prestige (Pan-Germanism) . 

(a) Ardent belief in the superiority of the German race and German 
"Kultur" over all other races and civilizations. 

(b) Hence the duty to promote the Germanization of the world, and to 
oppose the absorption of Germans by other nationalities. 

(c) Examples of these ideas in writings of Treitschke, Rohrbach, Bern- 
hardt etc. — -(See Conquest and Kultur, sees. 1, 2; War Cyclopedia, 
under 'Bernhardt,' 'Hegemony, German Ambition/ 'Kultur,' 'Pan- 
Germanism,' 'Treitschke,' 'William II.') 

"I hope that it will be granted to our German Fatherland to become 
in the future as closely united, as powerful, and as authoritative as once 
the Roman Empire was, and that just as in old times they said Civis 
Romanus sum, one may in the future need only to say, 'I am a German 
citizen.' " 

"God has called us to civilize the world ; we are the missionaries of 
human progress." 

"The ocean is indispensable for Germany's greatness, but the ocean 
also reminds us that neither on it nor across it in the distance can any 
great decision be again consummated without Germany and the German 
Emperor." — (Speeches of Emperor William II.) 

"The German race is called to bind the earth under its control, to 
exploit the natural resources and physical powers of man, to use the 
passive races in subordinate capacity for the development of its Kultur." 
— (Ludwig Woltmann, Politische Anthropologic , 1913.) 

"If people should ask us whether we intend to become a world power 
that overtops the world powers so greatly that Germany would be the only 
real World Power, the reply must be that the will to world power has no 
limit." — (Adolph Grabowsky, in Dasneue Deutschland, October 28, 1914.) 

"By German Kultur the world shall be healed, and from their experience 
those who have heard only lies about German Kultur will perceive, will 
feel in their own bodies, what German means and how a nation must be 
made up, if it wishes to rule the world." — (Benedikt Haag, Deutschland 
und der Weltkrieg, 1914.) 

"With the help of Turkey, India and China may be conquered. Having 
conquered these Germany should civilize and Germanize the world, and 
the German language would become the world language." — (Theodor 
Springman, Deutschland und der Orient, 1915.) 

"Our next war will be fought for the highest interests of our country 
and of«mankind. This will invest it with importance in the world's history. 
'World power or downfall!' will be our rallying cry." — (Bernhardi, Ger- 
many and the Next War, 1911, p. 154.) 



8 THE GREAT WAR 

II. Militarism and Armaments 

1 . Definition of militarism . It is a state of mind ; not the having of an army, 

no matter how large, but the exaltation of it to the chief place in the State, 
the subordination to it of the civil authorities . Joined to this is thereliance 
upon military force in every dispute. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 
'Militarism,' 'Prussianism,' etc.; C. Altschul, German Mlitarism and 
Its German Critics, pp. 20-21.) 

2. Militarism and the military class dominant in Germany. 

(a) Historical reasons for this : lack of defensible frontiers ; hostile 
neighbors, etc. Relation also to topics under heading I. 

(b) The Zabern Incident (1913) as a practical example of military 
domination. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Zabern,' 'Luxemburg, 
R,osa'; Altschul, German Militarism.) 

(c) Quotations showing German exaltation of war and army, etc. — 
(See Conquest and Kultur, sees. 4, 5.) 

"Because only in war all the virtues which militarism regards highly 
are given a chance to unfold, because only in war the truly heroic comes 
into play, for the realization of which on earth militarism is above all 
concerned ; therefore it seems to us who are filled with the spirit of 
militarism that war is a holy thing, the holiest thing on earth ; and this 
high estimate of war in its turn makes an essential ingredient of the mili- 
tary spirit. There is nothing that tradespeople complain of so much as 
that we regard it as holy." — (Werner Sombart, Handler und Helden, 
1915.) 

"War is the noblest and holiest expression of human activity. For 
us, too, the glad, great hour of battle will strike. Still and deep in the 
German heart must live the joy of battle and the longing for it. Let us 
ridicule to the utmost the old women in breeches who fear war and deplore 
it as cruel and revolting. No ; war is beautiful. Its august sublimity 
elevates the human heart beyond the earthly and the common." — 
(Jung-Deutschland, official organ of Young Germany, October, 1913.) 

"War is for us only a means, the state of preparation for war is more 
than a means, it is an end. If we were not beset with the danger of war, 
it would be necessary to create it artificially, in order to strengthen our 
softened and weakened Germanism, to make bones and sinews." — 
(Ernst Haase, Die Zukunft des deutschen Volkslums, 1908.) 

"It is the soldier and the army, not parliamentary majorities and votes, 
that have welded the German Empire together. My confidence rests 
with the army." — (Emperor William II.) 

Otfried Nippold, a University professor and jurist, was shocked to 
observe, on his return to Europe from a residence of several years in 
Japan, the extraordinary growth in Germany of militarism and the "jingo" 
spirit. At the end of a book which he compiled, made up of statements 
by prominent Germans in 1912-13 advocating war and conquest, he 
said : "The evidence submitted in this book amounts to an irrefutable 
proof that a systematic stimulation of the war spirit is going on, based 



FUNDAMENTAL CAUSES 9 

on the one hand on the wishes of the Pan-German League and on the 
other on the agitation of the Defense Association [Wehrverein]. . . . 
War is represented not merely as a possibility that might arise, but as 
a necessity that must come about, and the sooner the better. In the 
opinion of these instigators, the German nation needs a war; a long- 
continued peace seems regrettable to them just because it is a peace, no 
matter whether there is any reason for war or not, and therefore, in case 
of need, one must simply strive to bring it about. . . . The desire of 
the political visionaries in the Pan-German camp for the conquest of 
colonies suits the purpose of our warlike generals very well ; but to them 
this is not an end, but only a means. War as such is what really matters 
to them. For if their theory holds good, Germany, even if she conquered 
ever so many colonies, would again be in need of war after a few decades, 
since otherwise the German nation would again be in danger of moral de- 
generation. The truth is that, to them, war is a quite normal institution 
of international intercourse, and not in any way a means of settling great 
international conflicts — not a means to be resorted to only in case of 
great necessity." — (Der deutsche Chauvinismus , 1913, pp. 113-117; 
quoted in Conquest and Kultur, 137-139.) 

3. The competition in armaments. Europe an "armed camp" following 

1871, with universal military service, and constantly increasing military 
forces and expenditures. The trained forces at the beginning of the war 
were estimated approximately as follows: Prussia, 4,100,000; Germany, 
4,250,000 ; Austria, 3,600,000 ; France, 4,000,000; Great Britain (includ- 
ing its "Territorials" or trained militia), 707,000. 

4. Germany, already the first of military powers, planned a Navy to rival 

that of England. Her first Naval Bill was introduced in 1898; Great 
Britain's reverses in the Boer War (1899-1902) greatly stimulated German 
naval activities. 

III. Failure of the Hague Peace Conferences of 1899 and 1907, and of the 
Naval Conference of London (1908-9) 

1. History of the Hague conferences. Agency of Russia and the United 

States in calling them. Their positive results in formulating international 
law and establishing a tribunal at the Hague. — (See War Cyclopedia, 
under 'Hague Conferences,' 'Hague Conventions,' 'Hague Regulations,' 
'Hague Tribunal.') 

2. Plans therein for disarmament and compulsory arbitration defeated by 

Germany and Austria. — (See War Cyclopedia, under Arbitration, Ger- 
man Attitude,' 'Disarmament, German Attitude ' ; Conquest and Kultur, 
pp. 41-46.) 

3. General policy of Germany with reference to arbitration. Refusal to enter 

into an arbitration treaty with the United States. — (See Conquest and 
Kultur, sees. 4,5; War Cyclopedia, under 'Arbitration, German Attitude,' 
'Peace Treaties.') 

4. British vs. German views of the "freedom of the seas," as revealed at the 



10 THE GREAT WAR 

Hague Conferences and the Naval Conference of London. — (See War 
Cyclopedia, under 'Freedom of the Seas/ 'Declaration of London,' etc.) 
"The German view of freedom of the seas in time of war was that a 
belligerent should have the right to make the seas dangerous to neutrals 
and enemies alike by the use of indiscriminating mines ; and that neutral 
vessels should be liable to destruction or seizure without appeal to any 
judicial tribunal if in the opinion of the commander of a belligerent war- 
vessel any part of their cargo consisted of contraband. On the other 
hand, Germany was ever ready to place the belligerent vessels on the 
same footing as neutral vessels, and to forbid their seizure or destruction 
except when they were carrying contraband or endeavoring to force a 
blockade. In this way she hoped to deprive the stronger naval power of 
its principal weapon of offense — the attack upon enemy commerce — while 
preserving for the weaker power every possible means of doing harm alike 
to enemy or neutral ships. At the same time she was anxious to secure 
to belligerent merchant-ships the right of transforming themselves into 
warships on the high seas." — (Ramsey Muir, Mare Liberum: The Freedom 
of the Seas, pp. 8-13.) 

IV. Some Special Subjects of International Conflict 

1. French desire to recover Alsace-Lorraine, taken by Germany in 1871. — 

(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Alsace-Lorraine,' 'Franco-German Rivalry.') 
The economic importance of Alsace-Lorraine consists in its extensive 
deposits of iron ore; out of 28,600,000 tons mined by Germany in 1913, 
21,000,000 — about three-fourths — came from Alsace-Lorraine (chiefly 
Lorraine) . 

2. Desire of Italy to reclaim its "unredeemed" lands held by Austria. — (See 

War Cyclopedia, 'Italia Irredenta.') 

3. Colonial and commercial rivalry among the Great Powers over Central 

and Northern Africa (Morocco especially) ; Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, 
and Persia; China and the Far East; South America, etc. — (See Ibid., 
under 'Morocco Question,' 'Franco-German Rivalry.') 

4. Increased gravity of questions concerning the Balkan Peninsula after the 

Turkish Revolution in 1908. Plans for Austrian and German domination 
in these regions {Drang nach Osten) conflicted with Russia's desire to 
secure Constantinople and an outlet to the Mediterranean, and threatened 
the security of Great Britain's communications with India. — (See Ibid., 
'Balkan Problems,' 'Drang nach Osten,' etc.) 

5. Grouping of the Great Powers into the Triple Alliance (1882) and the Triple 

Entente. Germany's fear of being "hemmed in" (alleged policy of 
"encirclement").— (See Ibid., 'Encirclement, Policy of,' 'Triple Alli- 
ance,' 'Triple Entente.') 

6. The Anglo-German Problem.— (See Sarolea, The Anglo-German Problem, 

1911 ; Conquest and Kultur, sec. 16.) Due to — ■ 

(a) Menace to Great Britain's industrial and maritime supremacy 
through Germany's rapid industrial development since 1870. 



FUNDAMENTAL CAUSES 11 

(b) Colonial and trade rivalry in Africa, Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, etc. 

(c) Hostility to Great Britain taught by Treitschke and others. Doctrine 
that England was decrepit — "a colossus with feet of clay" — and 
that her empire would fall at the first hostile touch. Toasts of 
German officers to "the Day" — when war with Great Britain should 
come. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Der Tag,' 'Treitschke,' etc.) 

"If our Empire has the courage to follow an independent colonial 
policy with determination, a collision of our interests with those of 
England is inevitable. It was natural and logical that the new Great 
Power in Central Europe should be compelled to settle affairs with all 
Great Powers. We have settled our accounts with Austria-Hungary, 
with France, with Russia. The last settlement, the settlement with 
England, will probably be the lengthiest and the most difficult." — 
(Heinrich von Treitschke.) 

(d) Attitude of Great Britain on the whole one of conciliation. A treaty 
drawn up in June, 1914 (uncompleted when the war broke out), 
gave Germany "concessions in the matter of the Bagdad Railway, 
the Mesopotamian petroleum springs and the Tigris navigation, 
which exceeded all expectations." — (Dr. Paul Rohrbach, quoted in 
S. S. McClure, Obstacles to Peace, p. 42.) 

(e) Failure of the two Powers to arrive at an agreement as to naval 
armaments and mutual relations. Great Britain proposed (in 1912) 
to sign the following declaration: 

"The two Powers being mutually desirous of securing peace and 
friendship between them, England declares that she will neither make, nor 
join in, any unprovoked attack upon Germany. Aggression upon Ger- 
many is not the subject, and forms no part of any treaty, understanding, 
or combination to which England is now a party, nor will she become a 
party to anything that has such an object." 

Germany refused to sign a similar declaration unless Great Britain 
would agree to stand aside and be neutral in any war which might break 
out on the continent, i.e., to abandon her new friends, France and Russia, 
and allow Germany to attack them unhampered by fear of British inter- 
ference. 

V. Summary and Conclusion 
For forty years political and economic theories and governmental policies, 
especially in Germany, had been' bringing a great European war ever nearer. 
Forces making for peace were also in operation, and at times it seemed that 
these would continue to control the situation. But in 1914 the influences 
making for war definitely triumphed in Germany and Austria, and precipitated 
the Great World War. 

VI. Reading References* 
Anon. I Accuse, By a German, 26-141. 
Angell, N. The Great Illusion, chs. i-viii. 

* For an extensive bibliography see "A Selected Critical Bibliography of the War," by Prof 
G. M. Dutcher, in The History Teacher's Magazine, for March, 1918 (also published separately, 
25 cents; McKinley Publishing Co., Philadelphia) . 



12 THE GREAT WAR 

Archer. Gems (?) of German Thought. 

Bang, J. P. Hurrah and Hallelujah. 

Barker, J. E. Modern Germany, 297-317, 798-829. 

Bemhardi, F. von. Germany and the Next War, 1-166, 226-259. 

Bourdon, G. The German Enigma. 

Cheradame, A. The Pan-German Plot Unmasked. 

Chitwood, O. P. The Immediate Causes of the Great War, ch. 1. 

Conquest and Kultur. (Committee on Public Information.) 

Davis, W. S. The Roots of the War, chs. xvii-xviii. 

Dawson, W. H. What is Wrong with Germany, 1-69, 89-191. 

Gauss, C. The German Emperor, as Seen in His Public Utterances 

Gerard, J. W. My Four Years in Germany, chs. iv-v. 

Gibbons, H. A. New Map of Europe, 21-57, 119-130. 

Grumbach, S., and Barker, J. E. Germany's Annexationist Aims. 

Hazen, C. D. Europe Since 1815, 728-736. 

, Alsace-Lorraine. 

Hovelaque, E. The Deeper Causes of the War. 

Hurd and Castle. German Sea-Power, 108-286. 

Hull, W. I. The Two Hague Conferences. 

Le Bon, G. The Phychology of the Great War, ch. iv. 

McLaren, A. D. Peaceful Penetration. 

Mach, E. von. What Germany Wants, ch. ix. 

Muir, R. Britain's Case Against Germany, ch. ii. 

Nystrom. Before, During, and After 1914, ch. xii. 

Out of Their Own Mouths. (Introduction by W. R. Thayer.) 

Rose, J. H. Origins of the War, chs. i, ii, v. 

Sarolea, C. The Anglo-German Problem. 

Schmitt, B. E. Germany and England, 70-115, 154-172. 

Usher, R. G. Pan-Germanism, 1-173, 230-250. 

Zangwill, I. The War for the World, pp. 135 ff . 

Periodicals — 

Archer, W. Fighting a Philosophy, in North American Review, 201 : 

30-44. 
Barker, J. E. The Armament Race and Its Latest Development, in 

Fortnightly Review, 93 : 654-668. 
Dillon, E.J. Italy and the Second Phase of the War, in Contemporary 

Review, 107 : 715-732. 
— , Cost of the Armed Peace, in Contemporary Revieiv, 105 : 

413-421. 
Eltzbacher, O. The Anti-British Movement in Germany, in Nineteenth 

Century, 52 : 190-210. 
Gooch, G. P. German Theories of the State, in Contemporary Review, 

107: 743-753. 
Huidekoper. The Armies of Europe, in World's Work for September, 

1914. 
Kellogg, V. Headquarters' Nights, in Atlantic Monthly, 120 : 145-155. 
Johnston, H. H. German Views of an Anglo-German Understanding, in 

Nineteenth Century, 68 : 978-987. 



H. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF THE WAR (1870-1914) 
I, Foundation and Character of the Present German Empire 

1. Franco-German War (1870-71), and the Treaty of Frankfort. France to 

pay an indemnity of one billion dollars and to cede Alsace-Lorraine. 

2. Formation of the German Empire; its undemocratic character. — (See 

CD. Hazen, The Government of Germany; War Cyclopedia, under 'Autoc- 
racy,' 'Bundesrat,' 'German Constitution,' 'Kaiserism,' 'Reichstag.') 

(a) The number of States in the Empire is twenty-five, with one im- 
perial territory (Alsace-Lorraine). The list includes four kingdoms, 
six grand duchies, five duchies, seven principalities, and three free 
cities. Each of these States has its separate State government, sub- 
ordinate to that of the Empire. 

(b) The king of Prussia is hereditary "German Emperor," with full 
direction of military and foreign affairs. 

(c) The Federal Council {Bundesrat) is a council of ambassadors ap- 
pointed by the rulers of the separate States, and responsible to them. 
It oversees the administration and initiates most legislation, and is 
the most powerful body in the Empire. The States are represented 
unequally in it. Prussia, which contains two-thirds of the population 
of Germany, has 17 votes out of a total of 61. (If we include the 
three votes allotted to Alsace-Lorraine in 1911, which are "in- 
structed" by the Emperor, Prussia has 20 votes in the Bundesrat.) 
Bavaria has six votes, Saxony and Wiirttemberg four each, and the 
other States fewer. 

(d) The Reichstag is the representative chamber of the legislature. It 
is composed of 397 members, of whom Prussia elects 236. Rep- 
resentative districts are very unequal in population. "A Berlin 
deputy represents on the average 125,000 votes; a deputy of East 
Prussia, home of the far-famed Junkers, an average of 24,000." 
The members are selected by manhood suffrage for a term of five 
years; but the Emperor may (with the consent of the Bundesrat) 
dissolve the Reichstag at any time and order new elections. 

(e) The administration of the Empire is in the hands of a ministry, 
headed by the Imperial Chancellor. Unlike the ministers of true 
parliamentary governments, the German ministers are responsible 
to the Emperor, and not to the legislative chamber. They do not 
need, therefore, to resign their offices when defeated in the Reichstag. 

II. The Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente 

1. The Triple Alliance formed by Germany, Austria, and Italy (1882). 
Germany's main object was to safeguard herself against an attempt by 
France to recover Alsace-Lorraine. As France recovered strength Ger- 
many plotted new aggressive designs against her. 

13' 



14 THE GREAT WAR 

2. Germany attempted in 1904-05 to form a secret alliance with Russia and 

France against Great Britain. Failure of the attempt owing to France's 
unwillingness to give up hope of recovering Alsace-Lorraine. The evidence 
of this attempt was published in 1917, in a series of letters signed "Willy " 
and "Nicky" which passed between the Kaiser and the Tsar, and which 
were discovered in the Tsar's palace after his deposition. — (See War 
Cyclopedia, under 'Willy and Nicky Correspondence ' ; Bernstein, Willy 
and Nicky Correspondence.) 

3. Formation of the Triple Entente. 

(a) Dual Alliance of France and Russia formed (1891) as a counter- 
poise to the Triple Alliance. 

(b) Settlement of England's disputes with France over certain African 
questions, etc. (1904), and with Russia over Persia, etc. (1907), 
established the Triple Entente ("good understanding") between 
those powers. 

"France and England were face to face like birds in a cockpit, while 
Europe under German leadership was fastening their spurs and impatient 
to see them fight to the death. Then suddenly they both raised their heads 
and moved back to the fence. They had decided not to fight, and the 
face of European things was changed." — (Fullerton, Problems of Power, 
p. 57.) 

III. Three Diplomatic Crises : 1905, 1908, 1914 

1. First Morocco crisis, 1905-06. — (See Conquest and Kultur, 120-126; 

War Cyclopedia, under 'Morocco Questions,' etc.) 

(a) French interests in Morocco ; slight interests of Germany. 

(b) The Tangier incident. The Kaiser, landing from his yacht in Tangier 
challenged France's policy in Morocco. 

(c) Delcasse, French Minister of Foreign Affairs, dismissed on Ger- 
many's demand. "We are not concerned with M. Delcasse's person, 
but his policy is a menace to Germany, and you may rest assured we 
shall not wait for it to be realized." — (German ambassador to France, 
in published interview.) 

(d) France brought to the bar of Europe in an international conference 
at Algeciras — which, in the main, sanctioned her Moroccan policy. 

(e) The purpose of Germany in this crisis, as in those which followed, 
was to humiliate France and to test the strength of the Triple En- 
tente. These were struggles to increase German prestige. 

2. Crisis over Austria's annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908. — (See 

War Cyclopedia, under f Bosnia-Herzegovina,' 'Congress of Berlin,' 
'Pan-Slavism,' 'Slavs,' etc.) 

(a) These provinces freed from direct rule of the Turks by Serbia and 
Russia, but handed over by the Congress of Berlin to Austria to 
administer (1878). 

(b) Austria seized the occasion offered by the "Young Turk" Revolution 



HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 15 

of 1908 to annex Bosnia and Herzegovina, and refused to refer the 
question to a European congress for settlement. Binding force of 
treaty obligations thus undermined, 
(c) Russia (not yet recovered from the Russo-Japanese War) was forced 
to acquiesce when the Kaiser ' ' took his stand in shining armor by the 
side of his ally." Humiliating submission imposed on Serbia. — (See 
below, ch. iv, I 2 a.) 

3. Second Morocco crisis, in 1911. — (See Conquest and Kultur, 120-126; 

War Cyclopedia, under 'Morocco Question.') 

(a) Agadir Affair. German cruiser "Panther" sent to Agadir as a 
protest against alleged French infractions of the Algeciras agree- 
ment, and "to show the world that Germany was firmly resolved 
not to be pushed to one side." — (Speech of the German Chancellor 
to the Reichstag.) 

(b) Great Britain, in spite of political difficulties at home, warned Ger- 
many that in case of war she would help France. 

(c) Adjustment of the Moroccan question (Treaty of November 4, 
1911.) Germany accepted compensation from France elsewhere in 
return for recognition of French protectorate over Morocco. 

(d) Furious resentment of the German military party at this outcome. 
"The humiliation of the Empire is so much the greater, since it is the 
Emperor himself who had engaged the honor of the German people 
in Morocco." — (Rheinisch-Westfalische Zeitung.) 

4. Hardening of the German resolve not to accept another diplomatic defeat. 

"It is not by concessions that we shall secure peace, but by the German 
sword." — (Speech in Reichstag, applauded by the German Crown 
Prince.) 

IV. Bagdad Railway and the "Middle Europe" Project 

1. Germany supplants England as the protector of Turkey against Russia. 

Speech of the Kaiser at Damascus, 1898: "The three hundred million 
Mohammedans who live scattered over the globe may be assured of this, 
that the German Emperor will be their friend at all times." 

2. The Bagdad Railway. Designed to connect Bagdad with Constantinople 

and the Central European railways. Germany obtained concession from 
Turkey for its construction in 1902-03. Political as well as economic 
motives involved. Threat to British rule in India by proposed extension 
to the Persian Gulf. — (See The President's Flag Day Address with Evidence 
of 'Germany 's Plans, note 15 ; Conquest and Kultur, sec. 8 ; War Cyclopedia, 
under 'Berlin to Bagdad,' 'Corridor,' etc.) 

3. The "Middle Europe" Project. This may be defined briefly as a plan for 

"a loosely federal combination for purposes of offense and defense, 
military and economic, consisting primarily of the German Empire and 
the Dual Monarchy [Austria-Hungary], but also including the Balkan 
States and Turkey, together with all the neutral States — Roumania, 
Greece, the Scandinavian kingdoms, and Holland — that can be drawn 



16 ' THE GREaT WAR 

within its embrace." — (W. J. Ashley, in Introduction to F. Naumann's 
Central Europe, translated by Christabel M. Meridith, 1916.) 

The plan includes the domination of this group State by Germany 
through (a) its control of the common financial and economic policy, and 
(b) its control of the military forces, based on universal military service. 
(Compare Prussia's control within the German Empire.) — (See Conquest 
and Kultur, sec. 8; War Cyclopedia, under 'Mittel-Europa,' etc.; 
The President's Flag Day Address, notes 15-17.) 

4. Union of the Middle Europe project and the Bagdad Railway project in 
a Berhn-to-Bagdad plan. 

"Their plan was to throw a broad belt of German military power and 
political control across the very center of Europe and beyond the Mediter- 
ranean into the heart of Asia; and Austria- Hungary was to be as much 
their tool and pawn as Serbia or Bulgaria or Turkey or the ponderous 
States of the East. Austria- Hungary, indeed, was to become part of the 
central German Empire, absorbed and dominated by the same forces and 
influences that had originally cemented the German States themselves. 
The dream had its heart at Berlin. It could have had a heart nowhere 
else ! It rejected the idea of solidarity of race entirely. The choice of 
peoples played no part in it at all. It contemplated binding together 
racial and political units which could be kept together only by force — 
Czechs, Magyars, Croats, Serbs, Roumanians, Turks, Armenians — the 
proud States of Bohemia and Hungary, the stout little commonwealths 
of the Balkans, the indomitable Turks, the subtile peoples of the East. 
These peoples did not wish to be united. They ardently desired to direct 
their own affairs, would be satisfied only by undisputed independence. 
They could be kept quiet only by the presence or the constant threat of 
armed men. They would live under a common power only by sheer com- 
pulsion and await the day of revolution. But the German military 
statesmen had reckoned with all that and were ready to deal with it 
in their own way." — (President Wilson, Flag Day Address, June 14, 1917.) 
"Across the path of this railway to Bagdad lay Serbia — an independent 
country whose sovereign alone among those of southeastern Europe had no 
marriage connection with Berlin, a Serbia that looked toward Russia. 
That is why Europe was nearly driven into war in 1913 ; that is why 
Germany stood so determinedly behind Austria's demands in 1914 and 
forced war. She must have her 'corridor' to the southeast; she must 
have political domination all along the route of the great economic 
empire she planned. She was unwilling to await the process of 'peaceful 
penetration'." — {The President's Flag Day Address, with Evidence of 
Germany's Plans, note 15.) 

V. Tripolitan and Balkan Wars, 1911-13 

(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Balkan Wars/ 'Constantinople,' 'Drang 
nach Osten,' 'Young Turks.') 

1. War of Italy with Turkey over Tripoli (1911-12). Claims of Italy on 
Tripoli ; weakness of Turkey following Young Turk revolution of 1908 ; 
unfavorable attitude of Italy's allies (Germany and Austria) to the 



HISTORICAL BACKGROUND 17 

war as endangering their relations with Turkey. Treaty of Lausanne 
(October 15, 1912) transfers Tripoli from Turkish to Italian rule. 

War of Balkan Allies against Turkey (1912-13). 

(a) Secret league of Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Montenegro to expel 
Turkey from Europe and liberate their fellow Christians from 
Turkish misrule. War declared October 16, 1912. 

(b) Inability of the Great Powers, because of their own divergent aims, 
to restrain the Balkan allies. 

(c) Success of the allies. By the Treaty of London (May 30, 1913) 
Turkey was to surrender all territories in Europe except Con- 
stantinople and a small strip of adjacent territory (Enos-Midia line.) 

War among the Balkan Allies (June 30 to July 29, 1913). 

(a) Bulgaria (with Austria's support) attacked her allies as a result of 
disputes over division of conquered territory. 

(b) Roumania joined Serbia, Greece, and Montenegro in defeating 
Bulgaria. Turkey recovered Adrianople. 

(c) Treaty of Bucharest (August 10, 1913). Most of the conquered 
territory was given to Greece, Serbia, and Montenegro, though 
Serbia was denied (through Austrian, German, and Italian pressure) 
an outlet to the Adriatic. A smaller share was given Bulgaria. 
Roumania secured a slice of Bulgarian territory. Albania was made a 
principality under a German ruler. 

Some wider features of these conflicts : 

(a) A general European war was prevented (though with difficulty) by 
statesmen of the different countries working through the agency of 
(1) diplomatic notes, and (2) diplomatic conferences held especially 
at London. Sir Edward Grey, British Minister of Foreign Affairs, 
the chief agent in maintaining peace. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 
'Grey, Viscount.') 

(b) Austrian and German influence was seriously impaired, for they 
"had guessed badly and supported the losing side— first Turkey and 
then Bulgaria." Their Balkan domination and Middle Europe 
project alike were threatened by the events of 1912-13. Correspond- 
ing increase of Russian and Serbian power. 

(c) A new assertion of power on the part of Germany and Austria, 
principally against Russia and Serbia, to recover the ground lost 
through the Balkan Wars and the Treat}?- of Bucharest, was made 
practically certain. 

VI. Reading References 

Barker, J. E. Modern Germany, 1-362. 
Bourdon, G. The German Enigma, ch. ii. 
Buelow, Prince von. Imperial Germany. 
Bullard, A. Diplomacy of the Great War, 1-160. 
Cheradame, A. The United States and Pangermania, chs. i-iii. 



18 THE GREAT WAR 

Chitwood, O. P. The Immediate Causes of the Great War. 

Davis, W. S. The Roots of the War (1918). 

Dawson, W. H. What is Wrong with Germany, 70-112. 

Dillon, E. J. A Scrap of Paper, introduction and ch. hi. 

Fife, R. H. The German Empire Between Two Wars. 

Fullerton, W. M. Problems of Power, 260-315. 

Gerard, J. W. My Four Years in Germany, chs. i-ii. 

Gibbons, H. A. New Map of Europe, 1-367. 

Hart, A. B. The War in Europe, ch. i-vi. 

Hayes, C. J. H. Political and Social History of Modern Europe, II, 
397-426, 490-539, 679-719. 

Hazen, C. D. Europe Since 1815, 303, 328, 601-644. 

, The Government of Germany (pamphlet). 

Holt, L. H., and Chilton, A. W. | History of Europe from 1862 to 1914, 
pp. 438-503. 

McClure, S. S. Obstacles to Peace, chs. ii-iii. 

Muir, R. Britain's case against Germany, ch. iv. 

Ogg, F. A. | The Governments of Europe, 202-225, 251-281. 

Oxford University Faculty. Why We Are At War, ch. ii-iii. 

Prothero, G. W. German Policy Before the War, ch. i. 

Rose, J. H. Development of the European Nations, II, 1-43. 

■ . Origins of the War, ch. hi, iv, vi. 

Schmitt, B. E. England and Germany, 219-357, 366-377. 

Schurman, J. G. The Balkan Wars. 

Seymour, C. Diplomatic Background of the War. 

Tardieu, A. France and the Alliances. 

Urquhart, F. F. The Eastern Question (Oxford Pamphlets, No. 17). 

Villard, O. G. Germany Embattled, 126-156. 
Periodicals — 

Anon. The Balkan League — History of Its Formation, in Fortnightly- 
Review, 93: 430-439. 

Anon. The Greater Servia Idea, in World's Work, for September, 1914, 
129-131. 

Anon. Austria — Disturber of the Peace, in Fortnightly Review, 93 
249-264, 598-602. 

Barker, J. E. The War in the Balkans, in Fortnightly Review, 92 
813-825. 

Chirol, Sir V. Turkey in the Grip of Germany, in Quarterly Review, 222 
231-251. 

Colquhon . The New Balance of Power , in North American Review ,191 :18-28 

Dillon, E. J. Foreign Affairs, in Contemporary Review, 95 : 619-638 
492-510. 

Johnston, H. H. Africa and the Eastern Railway Schemes, in Nineteenth 
Centunj, 72 : 558-569. 

Marriott, J. A. R. Factors in the Problem of the Near East, in Fort- 
nightly Review, 99 : 943-953. 

O'Connor. The Bagdad Railway, in Fortnightly Review, 95: 201-216, 

Trevelyan, G. M. Serbia and Southeastern- Europe, in Atlantic Monthly. 
116: 119-127. 



m. INDICATIONS THAT GERMANY AND AUSTRIA PLANNED AN 
AGGRESSIVE STROKE BEFORE JUNE 28, 1914 

I. Austria Proposed an Attack on Serbia in 1913 
(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Austria and Serbia, 1913.') 

1. Austria's Proposal to Italy (August 9, 1913 — the day before the Peace of 

Bucharest.) 

"Austria has communicated to us and to Germany her intention of 
taking action against Serbia, and defines such action as defensive, hoping 
to bring into operation the casus foederis of the Triple Alliance. . . ." 
— (Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs, in dispatch of August 9, 1913 ; 
revealed by ex-Prime Minister Giolitti in speech of December 5, 1914. 
See Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 401.) 

2. Italy declined the proposal, as (apparently) did Germany also. The 

declination of the latter was probably due to the fact that German military 
preparations were not yet completed. — (See below, VI.) 

"If Austria intervenes against Serbia, it is clear that a casus foederis 
cannot be established. It is a step which she is taking on her own account, 
since there is no question of defense, inasmuch as no one is thinking of 
attacking her. It is necessary that a declaration to this effect should be 
made to Austria in the most formal manner, and we must hope for 
action on the part of Germany to dissuade from this most perilous 
adventure." — (Reply of Prime Minister Giolitti to above dispatch, 
Ibid.) 

II. Secret Military Report on Strengthening the German Army 
(March 19, 1913) 

This report came into the possession of the French Minister of War in 
some unexplained way soon after it was drawn up ; it is published in French 
Yellow Book, No. 2; Collected Diplomatic Documents, pp. 130-133. 

The following extracts occur in the part headed 'Aim and Obligations of 
Our National Policy, of Our Army, and of the Special Organizations for 
Army Purposes ' : 

1. Minds of the people must be prepared. — (See Conquest and Kultur, sees. 
15-16; War Cyclopedia, under 'Pan-Germanism,' 'Pan-Germans Urge 
War in 1913,' etc.) 

"We must allow the idea to sink into the minds of our people that our 
armaments are an answer to the armaments and policy of the French. 
We must accustom them to think that an offensive war on our part is a 
necessity in order to combat the provocations of our adversaries. . . . 
We must so manage matters that under the heavy weight of powerful 

19 



20 THE GREAT WAR 

armaments, considerable sacrifices , and strained political relations, an 
outbreak [of war] should be considered as a relief, because after it would 
come decades of peace and prosperity, as after 1870. We must prepare 
for war from the financial point of view ; there is much to be done in this 
direction." — {Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 131.) 

2. "Stir up trouble in the North of Africa and in Russia." 

"We must not be anxious about the fate of our colonies. The final 
result in Europe will settle their position. On the other hand, We must 
stir Up trouble in the north of Africa and in Russia. It is a means of 
keeping the forces of the enemy engaged. It is, therefore, absolutely 
necessary that we should open up relations, by means of well-chosen 
agents, -with influential people in Egypt, Tunis, Algeria, and Morocco, 
in order to prepare the measures which would be necessary in the case of 
a European war. . . . The first attempt which was made some years 
ago opened up for us the desired relations. Unfortunately these relations 
were not sufficiently consolidated." — (Ibid., p. 132.) 

3. Small states to be coerced. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Neutralized 

State,' 'Netherlands, German View,' etc.) 

"In the next European war it will also be necessary that the small 
States should be forced to follow us or be subdued. In certain conditions 
their armies and their fortified places can be rapidly conquered or neutral- 
ized ; this would probably be the case with Belgium and Holland, so as 
to prevent our enemy in the west from gaining territory which they could 
use as a base of operations against our flank . In the north we have nothing 
to fear from Denmark and Scandinavia. ... In the south, Switzerland 
forms an extremely solid bulwark, and we can rely on her energetically 
defending her neutrality against France, and thus protecting our flank."— 
{Ibid., p. 132.) 

4. No guaranty to Belgium for security of her neutrality. — (See Conquest 

and Kuliur, sec. 11 ; War Cyclopedia, under 'Belgium, Neutralization 
of.') 

"Our aim must be to take the offensive with a large superiority from 
the first days. . . . If we could induce these States [on our northwestern 
frontier] to organize their system of fortification in such a manner as to 
constitute an effective protection for our flank, we could abandon the 
proposed invasion. . . . If , on the contrary, their defensive organization 
was established against us, thus giving definite advantage to our adversary 
in the west, we could in no circumstances offer Belgium a guaranty for 
the security of her neutrality." — (Ibid., p. 133.) 

5. Short-term ultimatum to be issued.— (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Serbia, 

Austrian Ultimatum.') 

"The arrangements made with this end in view allow us to hope that 
it will be possible to take the offensive immediately after the complete 
concentration of the army of the Lower Rhine. An ultimatum with a 
short time-limit, to be followed immediately by invasion, would allow 



AN AGGRESSIVE STROKE PLANNED 21 

a sufficient justification for our action in international law." — {Ibid., 
p. 133.) 

6. Prizes of the war. — (See Conquest and Kultur, sec. 17.) 

"We will . . . remember that the provinces of the ancient German 
Empire, the County of Burgundy [Franche Comte, acquired by Louis 
XIV] and a large part of Lorraine, are still in the hands of the French ; 
that thousands of brother Germans in the Baltic provinces [of Russia] 
are groaning under the Slav yoke. It is a national question that Ger- 
many's former possessions should be restored to her." — {Ibid., p. 133.) 

III. Changed Attitude of the Kaiser : Interview with King Albert 
of Belgium (November, 1913) 

1. Circumstances of the interview; held in the presence of General von 

Moltke (chief of the German General Staff) and reported to Jules Cambon, 
the French ambassador at Berlin, "from an absolutely reliable source." 
Published in French Yellow Book, No. 6 ; Collected Diplomatic Documents, 
pp. 142-3. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Albert I,' 'William II,' etc.) 

2. War with France regarded by the Kaiser as inevitable. — (See War Cyclo- 

pedia, under 'William II, Ambitions.') 

"This conversation, it appears, has made a profound impression on 
King Albert. ■ I [Cambon] am in no way surprised at the impression he 
gathered, which corresponds with what I have myself felt for some time. 
Enmity against us is increasing, and the Emperor has ceased to be the 
friend of peace. 

"The person addressed by the Emperor had thought up till then, as 
did all the world, that William II, whose personal influence had been 
exerted on many critical occasions in support of peace, was still in the 
same state of mind. He found him this time completely changed. The 
German Emperor is no longer in his eyes the champion of peace against 
the warlike tendencies of certain parties in Germany. William II has 
come to think that war with France is inevitable, and that it must come 
sooner or later. . . . 

"General von Moltke spoke exactly in the same strain as his sovereign. 
He,- too, declared war to be necessary and inevitable, but he showed him- 
self still more assured of success, 'for,' he said to the King [Albert], 
'this time the matter must be settled, and your Majesty can have no 
conception of the irresistible enthusiasm with which the whole German 
people will be carried away when that day comes'." — {Collected Diplo- 
matic Documents, p. 142.) 

3. Cambon's comment on the interview. 

"As William II advances in years, family traditions, the reactionary 
tendencies of the court, and especially the impatience of the soldiers, 
obtain a greater empire over his mind. Perhaps he feels some slight 
jealousy of the popularity acquired by his son, who flatters the passions 
of the Pan-Germans, and who does not regard the position occupied by 
the Empire in the world as commensurate with its power. Perhaps the 



22 THE GREAT WAR 

reply of France to the last increase of the Germany army [German army 
law of 1913, cited below; France met this by increasing her military 
service from two years to three years], the object of which was to establish 
the incontestable supremacy of Germany is, to a certain extent, responsible 
for his bitterness, for, whatever may be said, it is realized that Germany 
cannot go much further. 

"One may well ponder over the significance of this conversation. The 
Emperor and his Chief of the General Staff may have wished to impress 
the King of the Belgians and induce him not to make any opposition in 
the event of a conflict between us. . . ." — (Ibid., p. 143.) 

IV. German Public Opinion as Reported by French. Diplomatic and Consular 
Agents (July 30, 1913) 

(In French Yellow Book, No. 5; Collected Diplomatic Documents, 
pp. 136-142.) 

1. The Moroccan settlement considered a diplomatic defeat. — (See Conquest 

and Kultur, sec. 16.) 

"... Here is a synthesis of all these opinions : The Treaty of the 
4th November is a diplomatic defeat, a proof of the incapacity of German 
diplomacy and the carelessness of the Government (so often denounced), 
a proof that the future of the Empire is not safe without a new Bismarck ; 
it is a national humiliation, a lowering in the eyes of Europe, a blow to 
German prestige, all the more serious because up to 1911 the military 
supremacy of Germany was unchallenged, and French anarchy and the 
powerlessness of the Republic were a sort of German dogma." — (Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 136.) 

2. Forces making for peace. 

"There are in the country forces making for peace, but they are un- 
organized and have no popular leaders. They consider that war would 
be a social misfortune for Germany, and that caste pride, Prussian domi- 
nation, and the manufacturers of guns and armor plate would get the 
greatest benefit, but above aU that war would profit Great Britain. 
[Those favoring peace included] the bulk of the workmen, artisans, and 
peasants, who are peace-loving by instinct," etc. But the classes which 
prefer peace to war "are only a sort of make-weight in political matters, 
with limited influence on public opinion, or they are silent social forces, 
passive and defenseless against the infection of a wave of warlike feeling." 
—(Ibid., p. 137-138.) 

3. Forces making for war. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Arbitration, Ger- 

man Attitude,' 'Disarmament, German Attitude,' 'German Military 
Autocracy, Propaganda for War,' 'Militarism or Disarmament/ 'Pan- 
Germans Urge War in 1913,' 'War, German View,' etc.) 

"There is a war party, with leaders, and followers, a press either con- 
vinced or subsidized for the purpose of creating public opinion ; it has 
means both varied and formidable for the intimidation of the Govern- 
ment. It goes to work in the country with clear ideas, burning aspira- 



AN AGGRESSIVE STROKE PLANNED 23 

tions, a determination that is at once thrilling and fixed." It included the 
following : 

(a) Those who regard war as inevitable and hence "the sooner the 
better." 

(b) Those influenced by economic reasons — "over-population, over-pro- 
duction, the need for markets and outlets," etc. 

(c) Those influenced by "Bismarckism." — "They feel themselves hu- 
miliated at having to enter into discussions with France, at being 
obliged to talk in terms of law and right in negotiations and con- 
ferences where thay have not always found it easy to get right on 
their side, even when they have a preponderating force." 

(d) Those influenced by "a mystic hatred of revolutionary France," 
and others who acted from "a feeling of rancor." — (Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 139.) 

4. Social classes included in the war party. — (See Conquest and Kullur, sec. 
16; War Cyclopedia, under 'Coal and Iron as Cause of War,' 'German 
Diplomacy,' 'Junker,' 'Peace Terms, German Industrialists on,' 'Peace 
Terms, German Opinion as to,' 'Peace Terms, German Professors on,' 
'Treitschke,' etc.) 

(a) The country squires (Junkers) , who wish to escape the imposition of 
inheritance taxes ("death duties") "which are bound to come if 
peace continues. . . . This aristocracy is military in character, 
and it is instructive to compare the Army List with the year book of 
the nobility. War alone can prolong its prestige and support its 
family interest. . . . This social class, which forms a hierarchy 
with the King of Prussia as its supreme head, realizes with dread the 
democratization of Germany and the increasing power of the Socialist 
party, and considers its own days numbered." — (Collected Diplo- 
matic Documents, p. 140.) 

(b) The capitalist class ("higher bourgeoisie"), including the manu- 
facturers of guns and armor plate, big merchants, who demand 
bigger markets, and all who ' 'regard war as good business." Among 
these are "doctrinaire manufacturers" who "declare that the diffi- 
culties between themselves and their workmen originate in France, 
the home of revolutionary ideas of freedom — without France 
industrial unrest would be unknown." — (Ibid, p. 140.) 

(c) University professors, etc. "The universities, if we except a few 
distinguished spirits, develop a warlike philosophy. Economists 
demonstrate by statistics Germany's need for a colonial and com- 
mercial empire commensurate with the industrial output of the 
Empire. There are sociological fanatics who go even further. . . . 
Historians, philosophers, political pamphleteers and other apologists 
of German Kultur wish to impose upon the world a way of thinking 
and feeling specifically German. They wish to wrest from France 
that intellectual supremacy which according to the clearest thinkers 
is still her possession." — (Ibid., p. 140-1.) 



24- THE GREAT WAR 

(d) Diplomatists and others "whose support of the war policy is inspired 
by rancor and resentment. . . . German diplomatists are now in 
very bad odor in public opinion. The most bitter are those who since 
1905 have been engaged in the negotiations between France and 
Germany ; they are heaping together and reckoning up their griev- 
ances against us, and one day they will present their accounts in 
the war press. It seems as if they were looking for grievances chiefly 
in Morocco, though an incident is always possible in any part of 
the globe where France and Germany are in contact." — (Ibid, p. 141 .) 

5. Must war be considered inevitable ? 

"The opinion is fairly widely spread even in Pan-German circles, that 
Germany will not declare war in view of the system of defensive alliances 
and the tendencies of the Emperor. But when the moment comes, she 
will have to try in every possible way to force France to attack her. 
Offense will be given if necessary. That is the Prussian tradition. 

"Must war then be considered as inevitable? It is hardly likely that 
Germany will take the risk, if France can make it clear to the world that 
the Entente Cordiale and the Russian alliance are not mere diplomatic 
fictions but realities which exist and will make themselves felt. The British 
fleet inspires a wholesome terror. It is well known, however, that victory 
on sea will leave everything in suspense. On land alone can a decisive 
issue be obtained." — (Ibid., pp. 141-143.) 

V. Extraordinary Military Measures of Germany Taken Before 
June 28, 1914 

(See Conquest and Kultur, sec. 16; War Cyclopedia, under 'Egypt,' 
'German Army Act, 1913,' 'German Intrigue Against American Peace,' 
'Kiel Canal,' 'Sinn Fein,' 'South Africa,' etc.) 

1. Laws of 1911, 1912, and especially 1913, increased the German army in 

time of peace from 515,000 to 866,000 men. Great increase of machine- 
gun corps, aviators, etc. Enormous stocks of munitions prepared. 
Exceptional war tax levied of $225,000,000. Special war fund (for 
expense of mobilization, etc.) increased from $30,000,000 to $90,000,000. 

2. Reconstruction of Kiel Canal (connecting Baltic and North Sea) hastened 

so as to be ready in early summer of 1914. Fortifications of Helgoland, 
etc., improved. 

3. Strategic railways constructed leading to Belgian, French, and Russian 

frontiers. 

"Germany had made ready, at heavy outlay, to take the offensive at 
a moment's notice, and to throw enormous forces across the territories 
of two unoffending and pacific neighbors [Belgium and Luxemburg] in 
her fixed resolve to break through the northern defenses of France, and 
thus to turn the formidable fortifications of the Vosges. She has prepared 
for the day by bringing fully-equipped and admirably constructed rail- 
ways up to her neighbors' frontiers, and in some places across them. . . . 



AN AGGRESSIVE STROKE PLANNED 25 

An immense sum of money has been sunk in these railways, . . . and 
there is not the least prospect of an adequate return on them as com- 
mercial ventures. They are purely military and strategical preparations 
for war with France." — (See Fortnightly Review for February, 1910, and 
February, 1914, and New York Times Current History, II, 1000-1004.) 

4. Accumulation of war materials, etc. Exportation of chemicals used in 

making explosives greatly reduced in 1913-14, and importation of horses, 
foodstuffs, and fats (used in nitroglycerine) greatly increased. Great 
purchases of beds and hospital supplies in May, 1914 ; embargo on stocks 
of foreign pneumatic tires in Germany ; hasty collection of accounts by 
German merchants; transfer of bank balances, etc., from beginning of 
July, etc. — (See Le Mensonge du 3 Aout, 1914, pp. 9-10.) 

"The most important document is a circular dated June 9, 1914, in 
which the German General Headquarters orders all owners of factories 
to open the mobilization envelopes in their possession." — (Associated 
Press despatch, dated Paris, February 5, 1918, summarizing documents 
published in the newspaper Le Petit Parisien.) 

5. Recall of reservists from South America, etc., in May and June, 1914. 

6. Exceptional grand maneuvers of 1914. Ordered in May, these massed 

"500,000 men in Cologne, the Grand Duchy of Baden, and Alsace_ 
Lorraine for the month of August." — (Le Mensonge du 3 Aout, 1914, P- 9.\ 

7. Preparations for stirring up revolt in the British Empire. 

(a) In South Africa. Reply of the Kaiser (in 1913) to a communication 
from the future rebel leader, Colonel Maritz : "I will not only 
acknowledge the independence of South Africa, but I will even 
guaranty it, provided the rebellion is started immediately." — ■ 
(Speech of General Botha at Cape Town, July 25, 1915. See Rose, 
Development of the European Nations, 5th ed., II, p. 379.) 

(b) In British India. On July 8, 1915, indictments were brought in the 
Federal Court at San Francisco against 98 persons, including German 
consuls, at which time the Federal District Attorney said : ' ' For more 
than a year prior to the outbreak of the European war certain Hindus 
in San Francisco and certain Germans were preparing openly for 
war with England. At the outbreak of the war Hindu leaders, mem- 
bers of the German consulate here, and attaches of the German Gov- 
ernment, began to form plans to foment revolution in India for the 
purpose of freeing India and aiding Germans in their military oper- 
ations . ' ' The leaders of these defendants pleaded guilty to the charges 
against them in December, 1917. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 
'German Intrigue Against American Peace.') 

"Consideration of all testimony leads to the conviction that the India 
plot now before the Federal Court here [in Chicago] is but a very small 
part of the whole conspiracy. . . . The defendants appear to have 
traveled far and wide in promotion of their alleged work. And always, 
testimony indicates, German consuls were aware of what was going on 



26 THE GREAT WAR 

and ready to give things a push. Pro-Germanism all over the United 
States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Hawaii, Manila, China, Indo-China, 
Siam, Java, and various parts of Africa has been brought into the case. 
No part, according to the testimony, seems to have been detached. All 
blended into the whole scheme, which is alleged to have had its inspiration 
and propulsion in Berlin." — (Christian Science Monitor, October 19, 
1917.) 

8. Coaling arrangements made for German naval vessels (June 14, 1914). 

"A German cruiser, the Eber, was in dock at Cape Town a few days 
before the outbreak of war, and got away just in time. An intercepted 
letter addressed to the commander contained certain instructions from 
Berlin, which were dated June 14, 1914. These instructions revealed a 
complete system for coaling the German navy on the outbreak of war 
through secret service agents in Cape Town, New York, and Chicago. 

"The commander of the Eber was given the names of shippers and 
bankers with whom he could deal confidentially, the essence of the plan 
being that a collier would leave Table Bay [Cape Colony] ostensibly 
bound for England,, but really to meet a German warship at an agreed 
rendezvous. Naturally, so far as Cape Town is concerned, the arrange- 
ments have been upset owing to the discovery, and this, perhaps, explains 
why German cruisers have been more in evidence in North Atlantic 
waters than in the southern ocean." — (Cape Town correspondent of 
London Times, issue of October 6, 1914.) 



VI. Conclusion 

Before June 28, 1914, Germany willed, if not war, at least another trial 
of diplomatic strength in which the threat of war should enter as a decisive 
factor. 

"It now appears beyond the possibility of doubt that this war was made 
by Germany pursuing a long and settled purpose. For many years she 
had been preparing to do exactly what she has done, with a thoroughness, 
a perfection of plans, and a vastness of provision in men, munitions and 
supplies never before equaled or approached in human history. She 
brought the war on when she chose, because she chose, in the belief 
that she could conquer the earth nation by nation." — (Ex-Senator Elihu 
Root, speech in Chicago, September 14, 1917.) 

"There is a whole category of facts to which we do not, temporarily, 
attach a decisive importance, for the spirit of mathematics can invoke 
in its favor the benefit of coincidence. . . . It is a question of various 
measures taken by Germany (the State or individuals) long before the 
menace of war was appreciable. . . . Certain persons would see in those 
measures, of which the war has demonstrated the utility, the proof that 
Germany had, months before, taken the resolve to launch the European 
war in 1914. When one has seen the German Government at work, this 
hypothesis is not extravagant." — (Le Mensonge du 3 AoUt, 1914, pp. 9-10.) 



AN AGGRESSIVE STROKE PLANNED 27 

"In the summer of 1913 I learned of a meeting of the Friedensfreunde 
to be held in Nuremberg in July. I attended the meeting and became 
acquainted with a number of leading Democrats, and with a good many 
others interested in peace, though not on a democratic basis. I was in- 
vited to come back to speak in the German cities, and I found time in 
December ... to give lectures in Frankfurt, Wiesbaden, Mannheim, 
Stuttgart, and Munich. Through my friends I learned a good deal of the 
plans of the Pan-Germanists and especially of the German General Staff. 

"In brief, they hoped to bring on war in 1914. Presumably, at that 
time, through disturbances to be created in Alsace-Lorraine. They were 
then proposing to take Belgium and Holland — Holland for the sake of 
making Antwerp the center for the coming attack upon England. They 
wished especially to take the two departments of Nord and Pas-de-Calais 
from France. They proposed to make of Boulogne the great seaport of 
Germany, surrounding its broad flat bay with breakwaters, doing all this 
before England would enter the war, and removing the German fleet to 
Boulogne. They had a new German name for Boulogne, but I do not find 
it in my notes and do not recollect it. They were also to take Paris and 
exact an indemnity that would pay the expenses of the war; 25,000,- 
000,000 marks was the figure I heard mentioned. After this, they were to 
treat France with great leniency, relieving her of all necessity for maintain- 
ing an army and navy and defending her from her great arch-enemy 
Great Britain. It was thought that France being wholly degenerate 
would not resist, and she could then devote herself to commerce and to the 
continuing of loans of money to finance German industry. . . . 

"I suppose that the Zabern incident and the arrest of 'Oncle Hansi' 
(Jean Jacques Waltz) were moves in the direction of inciting trouble in 
Alsace, getting a protest from France to be followed by a sudden ulti- 
matum. The death of the Archduke [Francis Ferdinand, June 28, 1914], 
whether planned in Budapesth or not, served to make the way to war easier, 
by beginning it in the southeast." — (Signed statement by David Starr 
Jordan.) 

"Not as weak-willed blunderers have we undertaken the fearful risk 
of this war. We wanted it. Because we had to wish it and could wish it. 
May the Teuton devil throttle those winners whose pleas for excuses 
make us ludicrous in these hours of lofty experience ! We do not stand, 
and shall not place ourselves, before the court of Europe. Our power 
shall create new law in Europe. Germany strikes. If it conquers new 
realms for its genius, the priesthood of all the gods will sing songs of praise 
to the good war. . . . We are waging this war not in order to punish 
those who have sinned, nor in order to free enslaved peoples and thereafter 
to comfort ourselves with the unselfish and useless consciousness of our 
own righteousness. We wage it from the lofty point of view, and with the 
conviction, that Germany, as a result of her achievements, and in pro- 
portion to them, is justified in asking, and must obtain, wider room on 
earth for development and for working out the possibilities that are in 
her. The Powers from whom she forced her ascendancy, in spite of them- 



28 THE GREAT WAR 

selves, still live, and some of them have recovered from the weakening she 
gave them. . . . Now strikes the hour for Germany's rising power." — 

(Maximilian Harden, editor of DieZukunft; see New York Times Current 
History, III, p. 130.) 

VII. Reading References 

There is no systematic treatment in English of the subject of this 
chapter. In addition to the references cited above, see the various in- 
dexes to periodical literature on the topics indicated. William Stearns 
Davis, The Roots of the War (1918), especially ch. xxii-xxiii, ia full of 
suggestion. 



IV. THE AUSTRO-SERBIAN CONTROVERSY 
I. Introduction : Prior Relations of Serbia, Austria, and Russia 

1 . Previous history of Serbia : Its fleeting greatness under Stephen Dushan 

(died 1355) ; conquered by Turks, 1458 ; self-governing principality from 
1830 ; independent of Turkey, 1878 ; territory greatly increased through 
war with Turkey, 1912-13. Revival in recent years of "Greater Serbia" 
movement, directed largely against Austria-Hungary, which held Croatia, 
Bosnia, and Herzegovina, lands which by nationality and speech were 
Serbian and which barred Serbia from the sea. Compare Piedmont's 
unification of Italy, against Austrian resistance. — (See War Cyclopedia, 
under 'Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes.') 

2. Serbia's relations with Austria-Hungary. 

(a) Political estrangement due to Austria's high-handed armexatiorf of 
Bosnia in 190S, and the thwarting by Austria and Italy, in 1913, of 
Serbia's desire for any other outlet to the Adriatic. Declaration 
exacted of Serbia in 1909 (March 31) : 

"Serbia recognizes that the fait accompli regarding Bosnia has not 
affected her rights. ... In deference to the advice of the Great Powers, 
Serbia undertakes to renounce from now onwards the attitude of protest 
and opposition which she has adopted with regard to the annexation since 
last autumn. She undertakes, moreover, to modify the direction of her 
policy with regard to Austria-Hungary, and to live in future on good neigh- 
borly terms with the latter." — (British Blue Book, No. 4 ; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 4.) 

(b) Tariff disputes over importation of Serbian pigs into Austria- 
Hungary. A prohibitive tariff was imposed in 1906. 

(c) Continued agitation of Serbian revolutionary societies (especially 
the Narodna Odbrana) against the "dangerous, heartless, grasping, 
odious and greedy enemy in the north," who "robs millions of Serbian 
brothers of their liberty and rights, and holds them in bondage and 
chains." — {Austro- Hungarian Red Book, No. 19; Collected Diplo- 
matic Documents, p. 465.) 

(d) German plans for Berlin-Bagdad railway required that Serbia should 
be controlled by Austria. — (See above, ch. ii, IV 4.) 

3. Russia's interest in Serbia — founded upon kinship in blood, language, 

and religion, and on Russian aid in the past against Turkey (in 1806-12, 
1829-30, 1877-8). This interest was well known, and Austria and Ger- 
many recognized that their policy toward Serbia might lead to war with 
Russia. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Pan-Slavism.') 

"During the Balkan crisis he [the Russian Minister for Foreign Affairs] 
had made it clear to the Austrian Government that war with Russia 

29 



30 THE GREAT WAR 

must inevitably follow an Austrian attack on Serbia." — (Report of 
British ambassador to Russia. British Blue Book, No. 139; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 101.) 

"We were perfectly aware that a possible warlike attitude of Austria- 
Hungary against Serbia might bring Russia upon the field, and that it 
might therefore involve us in a war, in accordance with our duty as allies." 
- — (German White Book; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 406.) 

II. The Serajevo Assassination (June 28, 1914) 

1. Assassination of the Austrian Crown Prince Francis Ferdinand and his 

wife, while on an official visit to Serajevo, the capital of the Austrian 
province of Bosnia. Failure of first attempt at assassination by explo- 
sion of a bomb ; success of second attempt, some hours later, by revol- 
ver shots. The assassins were Austrian subjects of Serbian nationality. 
—(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Serajevo.') 

2. Opportuneness of the crime for Austria. — (See Ramsay Muir, Britain's 

Case Against Germany, p. 152.) 

III. Austrian Note to Serbia (July 23, 1914) 

1 . Preliminaries : Secret investigation of the crime by the Austrian court at 

Serajevo. (Reports of the alleged results in Collected Diplomatic Docu- 
ments, pp. 490-4; Austrian Red Book, Appendix 8, and German White 
Book, Appendix; summary, pp. 416-7.) Quieting reports as to its in- 
tentions issued by Austrian Government, but preparations made in 
secret for rigorous measures against Serbia. 

"A reckoning with Serbia, a war for the position of the Austro-Hun- 
garian Monarchy as a Great Power, even for its existence as such, cannot 
be permanently avoided." — (Austrian Minister at Belgrade to Austrian 
Government, July 21, 1914. In Austrian Red Book, No. 6; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 452.) 

2. Conference at Potsdam (July 5, 1914), at which a policy involving the 

probability of war was approved. The holding of such a conference has 
been denied by German newspapers, but the denial is not convincing. — 
(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Potsdam Conference;' New York Times, 
Current History, September, 1917, pp. 469-471.) 

3. General character of the Note. In effect an ultimatum to which uncon- 

ditional acceptance must be given within forty-eight hours. Humiliating 
character of its demands. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Serbia, Austrian 
Ultimatum.') 

"I had never before seen one State address to another independent 
State a document of so formidable a character." — (Sir Edward Grey, 
British Secretary for Foreign Affairs, in British Blue Book, No. 5; 
Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 13.) 

"The demands of that [the Austria^] Government are more brutal 



AUSTRO-SERBIAN CONTROVERSY 31 

than any ever made upon any civilized State in the history of the world, 
and they can be regarded only as intended to provoke war." — (German 
Socialist newspaper Vorwarts, July 25, 1914.) 

4. Some specific demands. The numbers attached are those of the Note 

itself. — (See British Blue Book, No. 4 ; Collected Diplomatic Documents, 
pp. 3-12.) 

"2. To dissolve immediately the society called Narodna Odbrana [the 
chief society for Serbian propaganda], to confiscate all its means of prop- 
aganda and to proceed in the same manner against other societies and 
their branches in Serbia which engage in propaganda against the Austro- 
Hungarian Monarchy. The Royal [Serbian] Government shall take the 
necessary measures to prevent the societies dissolved from continuing 
their activity under another name and form." 

"3. To eliminate without delay from public instruction in Serbia, 
both as regards the teaching body and also as regards the methods of 
instruction, everything that serves, or might serve, to foment the prop- 
aganda against Austria-Hungary." 

"5. To accept the collaboration in Serbia of representatives of the 
Austro-Hungarian Government for the suppression of the subversive 
movement directed against the territorial integrity of the Monarchy." 

"6. To take judicial proceedings against accessories to the plot of the 
28th June who are on Serbian territory ; delegates of the Austro- 
Hungarian Government will take part in the investigation relating 
thereto." 

5. Denial by Germany that she was consulted by Austria before sending the 

Note. 

"We, therefore, permitted Austria a completely free hand in her action 
toward Serbia, but have not participated in her preparations." — (German 
White Book; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 406.) 

This denial was, and is, generally disbelieved. (See Ramsay Muir, 
Britain's Case Against Germany, p. 8, and the evidence concerning the 
Potsdam Conference.) Germany's claim that she was ignorant of the 
Austrian Ultimatum was from the outset preposterous and against all 
reason. Intimately allied with Austria-Hungary and for a decade the 
dominating power in the diplomacy of the Central Powers in the Balkans 
and the Near East, is it possible to believe that she did not examine into 
and even give direction, in broad outline at least, to the policy of her 
ally at this critical stage in the development of her Pan-German program? 
The purpose of the denial, apparently, was. to satisfy Italy (Austria's 
other ally), which certainly was not consulted. 

6. Circumstances making a peaceful outcome more difficult : Absence of most 

of the foreign ambassadors from Vienna for their summer vacations ; 
immediate withdrawal of Austrian Minister for Foreign Affairs to a 
remote mountain resort, etc., etc. 



32 THE GREAT WAR 

7. Widespread anxiety over the situation, as threatening the peace of Europe. 
Russia, England, and France make urgent endeavors: 

(a) To induce Serbia to go as far as possible in meeting the demands of 
Austria. 

(b) To obtain an extension of the time limit, in order (1) that the Powers 
might be enabled to study the documentary material promised by 
Austria embodying the findings of the court at Serajevo ; and (2) to 
permit them to exercise a moderating influence on Serbia. Sharp 
refusal of Austria to extend the time limit. (For later proposals, 
see ch. v.) 

IV. Serbian Reply to the Austrian Note (July 25, 1914) 

(See British Blue Book, No. 39; Collected Diplomatic Correspondence, 
pp. 31-37.) 

1. To the gratification of Europe, Serbia — 

(a) Accepted eight of the ten Austrian demands. 

(b) Returned a qualified refusal to the other two. 

As to No. 5, the Serbian Government said that they "do not clearly 
grasp the meaning or the scope of the demand, . . . but they declare 
that they will admit such collaboration as agrees with the principle of 
international law, with criminal procedure, and with good neighborly 
relations." 

As to No. 6, they returned a temperate refusal (founded, according to 
Austrian claim, upon a deliberate misunderstanding of the nature of the 
demand) : "It goes without saying that the Royal [Serbian] Government 
consider it their duty to open an enquiry against all such persons as are, 
or eventually may be, implicated in the plot, . . . and who happen to 
be within the territory of the kingdom. As regards the participation in 
this enquiry of Austria-Hungarian agents or authorities appointed for 
this purpose by the Imperial and Royal [Austro-Hungarian] Government, 
the Royal [Serbian] Government cannot accept such an arrangement, 
as it would be a violation of the Constitution and of the law of crirnin?! 
procedure ; nevertheless, in concrete cases communications as to the 
results of the investigation in question might be given to the Austro- 
Hungarian agents." 

(c) In conclusion, Serbia suggested reference to the Hague Tribunal or 
to the Great Powers, in case its reply was not considered satisfactory. 

2 . Austria (to Europe 's amazement) found this reply dishonest and evasive . — 

(See Austro-Hungarian Red Book, No. 34; Collected Diplomatic Docu- 
ments, pp. 506-514.) 

The reply was received by the Austrian Minister at 5:58 p. m., on 
June 25 ; he left Belgrade on the 6 :30 train with all his staff. Grave appre- 
hensions were felt that this break of diplomatic, relations would be followed 
by European war. 

The Austrian Foreign Minister declared to the Russian Ambassador 



AUSTRO-SERBIAN CONTROVERSY 33 

(July 28) that his Government could "no longer recede, nor enter into 
any discussion about the terms of the Austro-Hungarian Note." — 
(British Blue Book, No. 93; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 70.) 

V. Austria Declares War on Serbia (July 28, 1914) 

1. In spite of the efforts at mediation of Great Britain, Russia, and France, 

Austria declared war on Serbia, July 28, 1914. 

2. Demand of Germany that the war be "localized" — i.e., that no othe r 

Power interfere with Austria's chastisement of Serbia. 

3. Belgrade bombarded, July 29-30, and the war begun. 

VI. Conclusions 

1. Austria and Germany wanted war with Serbia, and their chief fear was 
lest something might, against their will, force them to a peaceful settle- 
ment ; hence the haste and secrecy which attended their measures. 

"The impression left on my mind is that the Austro-Hungarian Note 
was so drawn up as to make war inevitable ; that the Austro-Hungarian 
Government are fully resolved to have war with Serbia ; that they consider 
their position as a Great Power to be at stake ; and that until punishment 
has been administered to Serbia it is unlikely that they will listen to 
proposals of mediation. This country [Austria-Hungary] has gone wild 
with joy at the prospect of war with Serbia, and its postponement or 
prevention would undoubtedly be a great disappointment." — (British 
ambassador at Vienna, July 27, 1914. In British Blue Book, No. 41; 
Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 38.) 

"He [the German Secretary of State] admitted quite freely that Austro 
Hungarian Government wished to give the Serbians a lesson, and that 
they meant to take military action. He also admitted that Serbian 
Government could not swallow certain of the Austro-Hungarian demands. 
. . . Secretary of State confessed privately that he thought the Note 
left much to be desired as a diplomatic document." — -(British charge at 
Berlin to Sir Edward Grey, July 25, 1914. British Blue Book, No. 18; 
Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 22.) 

"In the Viennese Note to Serbia, whose brazen arrogance has no prec- 
edent in history, each phrase bears witness that Austria-Hungary 
desired the war. . . . Only a war, for which the best minds of the army 
were thirsting, . . . could cure the fundamental ills of the two halves 
of the Austrian Empire, and of the monarchy. Only the refusal and not 
the acceptance of the claims put forward in the Note could have profited 
Vienna. 

' ' The question has been asked : Where was the plan of campaign 
elaborated— in Vienna or Berlin ? And some hasten to reply : In Vienna. 
Why do people tolerate the propagation of such dangerous fables? Why 
not say the thing that is (because it must be), namely, that a complete 
understanding in all matters existed between Berlin and Vienna." — 



34 THE GREAT WAR 

(Maximilian Harden, in Die Zukunft for August 1, 1914; quoted in G. 
Alexinsky, Russia and the Great War, 129-130.) 

2. Austria's object was to reduce Serbia to a state of vassalage, as a step to 

Austrian hegemony in the Balkan Peninsula. Her promises not to destroy 
Serbia's sovereignty, orl to annex her territory, therefore, failed to satisfy 
Serbia's friends. 

"Austria demanded conditions which would have placed Serbia under 
her permanent control." — (Prof. Hans Delbruck, a noted professor and 
statesman of Germany, in Atlantic Monthly, for February, 1915, p. 234.) 

3. Germany's objects were : 

(a) To recover her prestige, lost in the Agadir affair (1911) and in the 
Balkan wars (1912-13).' 

(b) To strengthen her ally Austria, and so increase her own power. 

(c) To humilate Russia and the Triple Entente, and to disrupt or render 
harmless the latter. 

(d) To promote the Central European — "Berlin to Bagdad" — project, 
and open a trade route to Saloniki, the most favorably situated sea- 
port for the commerce of Central Europe with the East. 

4. To advance these ends Germany and Austria deliberately incurred the 

grave risk of a general European war. 

VII. Reading References 

The diplomatic documents published by the various Governments ("White 
Book," "Blue Book," "Yellow Book," etc.), may most conveniently be found 
in the volume entitled Collected Diplomatic Documents Relating to the Out- 
break of the European War (indexed), published in this country by George 
H. Doran & Co., New York (price, $1.00). The two volumes edited by James 
Brown Scott, under the title, Diplomatic Documents Relating to the Outbreak 
of the European War (Oxford University Press, New York), are of great value. 
The American Association for International Conciliation, 407 West 117th 
Street, New York, has published the correspondence in a series of pamphlets 
which it distributes gratis so long as its supply lasts. Discussions of the cor- 
respondence may be found in: J. M. Beck, The Evidence in the Case; A. 
Bullard, The Diplomacy of the Great War; J. W. Headlam, History of Twelve 
Days; I Accuse, by a German, and The Crime, by the same author; M. P. 
Price, Diplomatic History of the War; E. C. Stowell, Diplomatic History of 
the War; L. H. Holt, and A. W. Chilton, History of Europe, 1862-1911}. 
pp. 539-559; W. S. Davis, The Roots of the War (1918), ch. xxiii. 



V. FAILURE OF DIPLOMACY TO AVERT WAR: GERMANY AND 
AUSTRIA AT WAR WITH RUSSIA AND FRANCE 

I. Outline of Events, July 21 to August 6, 1914 

July 21 . Secret orders preliminary to mobilization issued in Germany. 
These measures, including the movement of troops toward the French 
frontier, continued up to final mobilization. — (See Le Mensonge du 3 
Aout, 1914, PP- 14-25 ; Nineteenth Century and After, issue for June, 1917.) 

July 23. Austrian Note sent to Serbia. 

July 25. Reply of Serbia. Austrian Minister quitted Belgrade, severing 
diplomatic relations. 

July 27. Sir Edward Grey proposed a conference in London on the Serbian 
question. France, Russia, and Italy accepted; Germany refused. 

July 28. Austria declared war on Serbia. 

July 29. Russian mobilization on the Austro-Hungarian frontier. 

July 30. Bombardment of Belgrade. General mobilization in Russia begun. 

July 31. "Threatening danger of war" proclaimed in Germany. Germany 
sent ultimatums to Russia and to France. 

August 1. Orders for general mobilization in France and in Germany. 
Declaration of war by Germany against Russia. Italy declared that she 
would remain neutral since "the war undertaken by Austria, and the 
consequences which might result, had, in the words of the German 
ambassador himself, an aggressive object." — (British Blue Book, No. 
152; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 107.) 

August 2. Occupation of Luxemburg by Germany. Demand that Belgium 
also permit German troops to violate its neutrality. 

August 3. Belgium refused the German demand. Germany declared war on 
France. 

August 4. Germany invaded Belgium. Great Britain declared war on 
Germany. 

August 6. Austria-Hungary declared war on Russia. 

H. Proposals for Preserving Peace 

1. A conference in London proposed by Sir Edward Grey (July 27). To be 
composed of the German and Italian ambassadors to Great Britain, as 
friends of Austria, and the French ambassador and Grey himself, as 
friends of Russia. Its purpose, to discover "an issue which would prevent 
complications." 

"If it is borne in mind how incomparably more difficult problems had 
been successfully solved by the conference of ambassadors at London 
during the Balkan crisis, it must be admitted that a settlement between 

35 



36 THE GREAT WAR 

the Austrian demands and the Serbian concessions in July, 1914, was 
child's play compared with the previous achievements of the London 
conference." — (7 Accuse, p. 155.) 

The proposal was accepted by Russia, France, and Italy. It was 
declined by Germany (without consulting Austria) on the ground that 
she "could not call Austria in her dispute with Serbia before a European 
tribunal." {German White Book; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 409.) 
Grey explained that it "would not be an arbitration, but a private and 
informal discussion;" nevertheless, Austria and Germany continued to 
decline. 

2. Germany proposed (July 26) that France "exercise a moderating influence 

at St. Petersburg." The French Foreign Minister in reply "pointed out 
that Germany on her part might well act on similar lines at Vienna, 
especially in view of the conciliatory spirit displayed by Serbia. The 
[German] ambassador replied that such a course was not possible, owing 
to the decision not to intervene in the Austro-Serbian dispute." — (Russian 
Orange Book, No. 28; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 276.) 

3. Germany proposed direct negotiations between Russia and Austria over 

the Serbian question (July 27) . Austria declined these direct negotia- 
tions, even though proposed by her ally; (Was this due to collusion be- 
tween the two Governments?) 

4. The Kaiser (who unexpectedly returned to Berlin on July 26 from a 

yachting cruise) attempted to act as "mediator" between Russia and 
Austria ; but apparently he confined himself to the effort to persuade 
Russia ' ' to remain a spectator in the Austro-Serbian war without drawing 
Europe into the most terrible war it has ever seen." — (Kaiser to Tsar, 
July 29, in German White Book, exhibit 22; Collected Diplomatic Docu- 
ments, pp. 431-2.) 

5. The Tsar proposed, in a personal telegram to the Kaiser (July 29), "to 

give over the Austro-Serbian problem to the Hague Tribunal." 
{Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 542.) This telegram is omitted from 
the German White Book ! 

6. Proposal by Grey (July 29) that Austria should express herself as satisfied 

with the occupation of Belgrade and the neighboring Serbian territory 
as a pledge for a satisfactory settlement of her demands and should allow 
the other Powers time and opportunity to mediate between Austria and 
Russia. 

King George of England, in a personal telegram (July 30) to the Kaiser's 
brother, said : "I rely on William applying his great influence in order to 
induce Austria to accept this proposal. In this way he will prove that 
Germany and England are working together to prevent what would be 
an international catastrophe." — (Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 
539.) 

Grey 's expressed opinion (July 29) was that "mediation was ready to 
come into operation by any method that Germany thought possible if 



FAILURE OF DIPLOMACY 37 

only Germany would 'press the button' in the interests of peace." — 

{British Blue Book, No. 84; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 64.) 

7. The German Chancellor, von Bethmann Hollweg, impressed by the pros- 

pect of "a world conflagration in which England would go against us, 
and Italy and Roumania, by all indications, would not be with us," 
did in fact, on July 30, "urgently and emphatically ask the Vienna Cabinet 
to consider the acceptance of mediation on the proposed conditions." 
■ — (Revealed by von Bethmann Hollweg in the Reichstag, November 9, 
1916; see McClure, Obstacles to Peace, p. 53.) This belated pressure 
probably accounts for Austria's changed attitude on August 1 . 

8. Proposal of Russian Foreign Minister (July 30) : "If Austria, recognizing 

that the Austro-Serbian question has assumed the character of a question 
of European interest, declares herself ready to eliminate from her ulti- 
matum points which violate the sovereign rights of Serbia, Russia engages 
to stop her military preparations." — (Russian Orange Book, No. 60; 
Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 288.) 

Reply of German Foreign Minister that "he considered it impossible 
for Austria to accept our proposal." — (Russian Orange Book, No. 63; 
Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 289.) 

9. Second Proposal of Russian Foreign Minister (July 31) : 

"If Austria consents to stay the march of her troops on Serbian terri- 
tory ; and if, recognizing that the Austro-Serbian conflict has assumed 
the character of a question of European interest, she admits that the 
Great Powers may examine the satisfaction which Serbia can accord 
to the Austro-Hungarian Government without injury to her rights as a 
sovereign State or her independence, Russia undertakes to maintain her 
waiting attitude." — (Russian Orange Book, No. 67; Collected Diplomatic 
Documents, p. 291.) 

This proposal remained unanswered. 

10. Austria declared (Aug. 1) that she was then "ready to discuss the grounds 
of her grievances against Serbia with the other Powers."— (Russian 
Orange Book, No. 73; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 293.) 

Sir Edward Grey comments : "Things ought not to be hopeless so long 
as Austria and Russia are ready to converse." (British Blue Book, No. 
311 : Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 97.) From July 30 onwards" the 
tension between Russia and Germany was much greater than between 
Russia and Austria. As between the latter an arrangement seemed 
almost in sight." — (British Ambassador at Vienna, in British Blue Book, 
No. 161 ; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 117.) 

But it was then too late, as the German military chiefs had already 
resolved upon war, and were preparing the ultimatums which precipitated 
the conflict. 

III. German Ultimatums and Declarations of War Against Russia 
and France 
1. A council of war, held at Potsdam on the evening of July 29, apparently 
decided definitely to make war on France and Russia. 



38 THE GREAT WAR 

"Our innermost conviction is that it was on this evening tbat the 
decision of war was reached. The 5th of July, before his departure for a 
cruise on the coasts of Norway, the Kaiser had given his consent to the 
launching of the Serbian venture. The 29th of July he decided for war." — 
(Le Mensonge du 3 Aout, 1914, P- 38.) 

"People who are in a position to know say that those occupying the 
leading military positions, supported by the Crown Prince and his re- 
tainers, threatened the Emperor with their resignation en bloc if war were 
not resolved on." — (/ Accuse, p. 189.) 

2. General mobilization of Eussian army (July 30-31). This was grounded not 

merely on the measures of Austria, but on "the measures for mobiliza- 
tion [against Russia] taken secretly, but continuously, by Germany for 
the last six days." — (French Yellow Book, No. 118; Collected Diplomatic 
Documents, p. 223.) Also the publication about noon, July 30, of a 
special edition of the Berlin Lokal Anzeiger, announcing German mobiliza- 
tion, although shortly disavowed and suppressed, had its effect. 

The Tsar assured the Kaiser : "It is far from us to want war. As long 
as the negotiations between Austria and Serbia continue, my troops will 
undertake no provocative action. I give you my solemn word thereon." — 
(German White Book; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 411.) 

For evidence of German mobilization against France beginning as 
early as July 21, see Nineteenth Century and After, issue for June, 1917. 
Consult also I Accuse, pp. 194-201 ; War Cyclopedia, under 'Mobilization 
Controversy.' 

3. German ultimatum to Russia (July 31, midnight) demanding that the 

Government "suspend their military measures by midday on August 1 " 
(twelve hours) . 

Declaration of war against Russia at 7.10 p.m. on August 1, following 
Russia's failure to demobilize. — (Russian Orange Book, No. 76; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 294.) 

4. Demand addressed to France (July 31, 7.00 p.m.) as to "What the attitude 

of France would be in case of war between Germany and Russia?" (French 
Yellow Book, No. 117; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 223). In case 
France promised neutrality, the German ambassador was instructed to 
demand that Germany be allowed to occupy the fortresses of Toul and 
Verdun as a guaranty until the close of the war. (Secret dispatch re- 
vealed in March, 1918.) As no French Government could possibly 
grant such terms, the dispatch of July 31 was practically a declaration of 
war. 

The French reply gave no opportunity to present this insulting demand. 
The French Prime Minister answered (August 1, 1.04 p.m.) that "France 
would do that which her interests dictated." — (German White Book, ex- 
hibit 27; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 294.) 

Orders for a general mobilization of the French army were signed at 
3.40 p.m. the same day. 

Declaration of war by Germany against France followed on August 3. 
(French Yellow Book, No. 147; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 240.) 



FAILURE OF DIPLOMACY 39 

This declaration contained charges that France had already violated 
German territory (e.g., by dropping bombs from airplanes on railway 
tracks near Nuremberg). These charges are now shown to be falsehoods. 
(Le Mensonge du 3 AoM, pp. 130-230; pamphlet entitled, German Truth 
and a Matter of Fact, London, 1917.) To avoid possible clashes through 
hot-headedness of her troops and under-officers, France withdrew her 
troops 10 kilometers (about six miles) within her own frontiers. On the 
other hand, German bands repeatedly crossed the French frontier, and 
even killed a French soldier on French soil before the declaration of 
war. — {French Yellow Booh, No. 106.) 

Similar falsehoods were inserted in the Austrian declaration of war on 
Serbia, and in the German declaration of war on Russia. Falsehood and 
forgery were used with Machiavellian unscrupulousness by Germany in 
the conduct of her foreign affairs. Compare Bismarck's changes in the 
"Ems dispatch" at beginning of Franco-German war and his diabolical 
pleasure that war with France thus became certain. — (Bismarck's auto- 
biography, II. p. 101. See War Cyclopedia, under 'German Govern- 
ment, Moral Bankruptcy,' etc.) 



IV. German Responsibility for the War 

The testimony is overwhelming not only that Germany planned with 
Austria an aggressive stroke in 1914, but that in the end it was she who 
willed the war. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'War, Responsibility for.') 
"The constant attitude of Germany who, since the beginning of the 
conflict, while ceaselessly protesting to each Power her peaceful intentions, 
has actually, by her dilatory or negative attitude, caused the failure of all 
attempts at agreement, and has not ceased to encourage through her 
ambassador the uncompromising attitude of Vienna ; the German 
military preparations begun since the 25th July and subsequently con- 
tinued without cessation ; the immediate opposition of Germany to the 
Russian formula [of July 29-31] declared at Berlin inacceptable for Austria 
before that Power had ever been consulted; in conclusion, all the im- 
pressions derived from Berlin bring conviction that Germany has sought 
to humiliate Russia, to disintegrate the Triple Entente, and if these 
results could not be obtained, to make war." — (Viviani, French Minister 
for Foreign Affairs, July 31, in French Yellow Book, No. 114; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 221.) 

"Never in the history of the world has a greater crime than this been 
committed. Never has a crime after its commission been denied with 
greater effrontery and hypocrisy." — (/ Accuse, pp. 208-9.) 

"The German Government contrived the war jointly in concert with 
the Austrian Government, and so burdened itself with the greatest 
responsibility for the immediate outbreak of the war. The German 
Government brought on the war under cover of deception practised upon 
the common people and even upon the Reichstag (note the suppression 
of the ultimatum to Belgium, the promulgation of the German White 



40 THE GREAT WAR 

Book, the elimi n ation of the Tsar's despatch of July 29, 1914, etc.)-" — ■ 
(Dr. Karl Liebknecht, German Socialist, in leaflet dated May 3, 1916. 
See War Cyclopedia, under 'Liebknecht on German War Policy.') 

"In France, where they yearn for world peace as fervently as anywhere, 
it is already announced that nobody can any longer consider Russia the 
instigator of the world conflagration, the real mischief maker, but solely 
Austria and her ally. Germany. 

''And in England the conception is quite general that the German Em- 
peror, in his capacity of ally and counsellor of Austria, as the deciding 
element, could shake from the folds of his toga the die for War or Peace. 

"And England is right. As matters stand, the decision rests with 
William II. . . . But even the most energetic person is not free from 
influences, and the proofs are unfortunately within grasp that the camarilla 
of war barons (Kriegshetzer) is again at work, without the slightest qualm 
of conscience, in order to cross all activities of the Government and 
bring about what is monstrous — the world war, the world conflagration, 
the devastation of Europe." — (German Socialist newspaper Vorwarts, 
July 30, 1914; quoted in Altschul, German Militarism and Its German 
Critics, p. 39.) 

"The Prince [Lichnowsky, German ambassador to Great Britain in 
1914 declares 'that it would have been easy to find an acceptable solu- 
tion' for the two relatively small points left in dispute between Vienna 
and Belgrade, and that 'given good will everything could have been 
settled in one or two sittings' of the body proposed by Sir Edward [Grey]. 
'A hint from Berlin would have been enough to make Count Berchtold 
less satisfied with a diplomatic success and to cause his acquiescence 
in the Serbian reply. What happened? This hint was not given, on the 
contrary we pressed for war.' Sir Edward besought Germany to make 
a proposal of her own; 'we insisted upon war.' The Russian Foreign 
Minister made urgent appeals and definite declarations, and later the 
Russian Emperor 'sent positively humble telegrams in vain. Berlin 
went on insisting that Serbia must be massacred.' " — (From secret 
memorandum written by Prince Lichnowsky, published in March, 1918; 
summarized in Washington Star, March 28, 1918.) 

"The object of this war [on the part of the opponents of Germany] is 
to deliver the free peoples of the world from the menace and the actual 
power of a vast m il itary establishment controlled by an irresponsible 
government which, having secretly planned to dominate the world, 
proceeded to carry the plan out without regard either to the sacred obli- 
gations of treaU* or the long-established practices and long-cherished 
principles of international action and honor; which chose its own time 
for the war ; delivered its blow fiercely and suddenly ; stopped at no barrier 
either of law or mercy ; swept a whole continent within the tide of blood — 
not the blood of soldiers only, but the blood of innocent women and 
children also and of the helpless poor; and now stands balked but not 
defeated, the enemy of four-fifths of the world. This power is not the 
German people. It is the ruthless master of the Ger m an people. It is 



FAILURE OF DIPLOMACY 41 

no business of ours how that great people came under its control or sub- 
mitted with temporary zest to the domination of its purpose ; but it is 
our business to see to it that the history of the rest of the world is no 
longer left to its handling." — (President Wilson's reply to the Pope's 
peace proposals, August 27, 1917.) 



V. Reading References 

See I Accuse, and works previously cited by Bullard, Gibbons, Hayes, 
Headlam, Rose, Schmitt, Seymour, etc. The New York Times Current 
History contains much valuable material. 

Beck, J. M. The Evidence in the Case, chs. vi-vii, ix. 

Chitwood, O. P. Immediate Causes of the Great War, chs. v-vih 

Davis, W. S. The Roots of the War, ch. xxiii. 

Dillon, E. J. The Scrap of Paper, chs. vii-viii. 

Gibbons, H. A. The New Map of Europe, ch. xx. 

McClure, S. S. Obstacles to Peace, ch. iv. 

Oxford University Faculty. Why We Are at War, ch. v. .» 

Price, M. P. The Diplomatic History of the War, pp. 16-84. 

Stowell, E. C. The Diplomacy of the War of 1914, chs. iii-vii. 

Periodicals — 

Chirol, Sir V. The Origins of the Present War, in Quarterly Review 

(Oct., 1914). 
Dillon, E. J. Causes of the European War, in Contemporary Review 

(Sept., 1914). 
Ferrero, G. The European Tragedy, in Educational Review (Nov., 1914). 
Hill, D. J. Germany's Self-Revelation of Guilt, in Century Maaazine 

(July, 1917). 
"Politicus." The Causes of the Great War, in Fortnightly Review 

(Sept., 1914). 
Turner, E. R. Causes of the Great War, in American Political Science 

Review (Feb., 1915). 



VI. VIOLATION OF BELGIUM'S NEUTRALITY BRINGS IN 
GREAT BRITAIN 

I. Why Great Britain Was Expected to Stay Out 

1. Embittered state of party relations growing out of the Budget struggle of 

1909-11, the limitation of the veto of the House of Lords in 1911, violence 
of the suffragettes (' 'the wild women "), and the final passage of the Irish 
Home Rule bill (May 25, 1914). 

2. Serious threat of rebellion in northern Ireland (Ulster) against putting in 

force Irish Home Rule act. Organization of armed forces under Sir 
Edward Carson; "gun running" from Germany; complete failure of 
conference called by the king (July 21-24) to agree upon a compromise 
which should avert civil war . (Operation of the bill suspended , September 
18, until after the war.) 

3. Widespread labor troubles, especially among the railway workers. 

4. Unrest in India, following administrative division of the province of 

Bengal ; boycott movement ; revolutionary violence attending Nationalist 
(Hindu) agitations. 

5. Unwarlike character of the British people; a "nation of shopkeepers" 

supposedly unready for the sacrifices of war ; progress of pacifist opinions. 

6. Lack of an army adequate for use abroad. Composed of volunteers 

("mercenaries") instead of being based on compulsory service, it was 
regarded (in the Kaiser's phrase) as "contemptible." 

II. British Diplomacy and the War 

1. Sir Edward Grey, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, labored unre- 
mittingly for peace. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Grey and British 
Policy, 1914.') 

"Sir Edward Grey deserves more than any other the name of the 
'peacemaker of Europe' . . . His efforts were in vain, but his merit in 
having served the cause of peace with indefatigable zeal, with skill and 
energy, will remain inextinguishable in history."- — (/ Accuse, pp. 247-8.) 

' ' No man in the history of the world has ever labored more strenuously 
or more successfully than my right honorable friend Sir Edward Grey, 
for that which is the supreme interest of the modern world — a general and 
abiding peace .... We persevered by every expedient that diplomacy can 
suggest, straining to almost the breaking point our most cherished friend- 
ships and obligations, even to the last making effort upon effort and hoping 
against hope. Then, and only then, when we were at last compelled to 
realize that the choice lay between honor and dishonor, between treachery 
and good faith, and that we had at last reached the dividing line which 

42 



BELGIUM AND GREAT BRITAIN 43 

makes or mars a nation worthy of the name, it was then, and only then, 
that we declared for war." — (Prime Minister Asquith, at the Guildhall, 
London, September 4, 1914.) 

"Shoulder to shoulder with England we labored incessantly and sup- 
ported every proposal," etc. (Germa?i White Book; in Collected Diplo- 
matic Documents, p. 410.) Similar admissions that Great Britain strove 
sincerely and energetically for peace are found in other passages in the 
German White Book. Later the German Chancellor, von Bethmann 
Hollweg, declared: "The inner responsibility [for the war] lies on the 
Government of Great Britain. . . . England saw how things were 
moving, but did nothing to put a spoke in the wheel." (Speech in Reichs- 
tag, December 2, 1914.) This statement, however, is palpably false. — 
For testimony of German ambassador to Great Britain, see p. 40. 

British fleet kept together after the summer maneuvers (July 27). Im- 
portance of this step. 

"I pointed out [to the Austrian ambassador] that our fleet [was 
to have dispersed to-day, but we had felt unable to let it disperse. We 
should not think of calling up reserves at this moment, and there was no 
menace in what we had done about our fleet ; but, owing to the possibility 
of a European conflagration, it was impossible for us to disperse our forces 
at this moment. I gave this as an illustration of the anxiety that was 
felt [oyer the' Serbian question]." — (Sir Edward Grey, in British Blue 
Book, No. 48; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 43.) 

Her liberty of action reserved ; Great Britain was free from engagements 
(July 29). 

"In the present case the dispute between Austria and Serbia was not 
one in which we felt called to take a hand. Even if the question became 
one between Austria and Russia we should not feel called upon to take a 
hand in it. It would then be a question of the supremacy of Teuton or 
Slav — a struggle for supremacy in the Balkans ; and our idea had always 
been to avoid being drawn into a war over a Balkan question. If Germany 
became involved and France became involved, we had not made up our 
minds what we should do ; it was a case that we should have to consider. 
. . . We were free from engagements, and we should have to decide 
what British interests required us to do. I thought it necessary to say 
that, because ... we were taking all precautions with regard to our 
fleet, and I was about to warn [the German ambassador] not to count on 
our standing aside, but that it would not be fair that I should let [the 

. French ambassador] be misled into supposing that this meant that we had 
decided what to do in a contingency that I still hoped might not arise." — 
(Sir Edward Grey to the French ambassador, in British Blue Book, 
No. 87; Collected Diplomatic Documents, pp. 65-66.) 

Germany 's ' ' Infamous Proposal " of July 29 (following the Potsdam council 
of that date, at which war apparently was resolved upon). In return for 
British neutrality in case of war between Germany and France, the 
German Chancellor promised (a) not to aim at "territorial acquisitions 
at the expense of France" in Europe; (b) a similar undertaking with 



44 THE GREAT WAR 

respect to the French colonies was refused ; (c) the neutrality of Holland 
would be observed as long as it was respected^ by Germany 's adversaries ; 
(d) in case Germany was obliged to violate Belgium's neutrality, "when 
the war was over Belgian integritj 7 would be respected" if she had not 
sided against Germany." 

"He [the German Chancellor] said that should Austria be attacked by 
Russia a European conflagration might, he feared, become inevitable, 
owing to Germany's obligations as Austria's ally, in spite of his con- 
tinued efforts to maintain peace. He then proceeded to make the 
following strong bid for British neutrality. He said that it was clear, 
so far as he was able to judge the main principle which governed British 
. policy, that Great Britain would never stand by and allow France to be 
crushed in any conflict there might be. That, however, was not the 
object at which Germany aimed. Provided that neutrality of Great 
Britain were certain, every assurance would be given to the British 
Government that the Imperial Government aimed at no territorial ac- 
quisitions at the expense of France should they prove victorious in any 
war that might ensue. 

"I questioned his Excellency about the French colonies, and he said 
that he was unable to give a similar undertaking in that respect. As 
regards Holland, however, his Excellency said that so long as Germany's 
adversaries respected the integrity and neutrality of the Netherlands, 
Germany was ready to give His Majesty's Government an assurance that 
she would do likewise. It depended upon the action of France what 
operations Germany might be forced to enter upon in Belgium, but when 
the war was over, Belgian integrity would be respected if she had not 
sided against Germany." — (British ambassador at Berlin, in British 
Blue Book, No. 85; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 64.) 

5. This proposal was emphatically rejected by Great Britain. "What h e 

asks us in effect is to engage to stand by while French colonies are taken 
and France is beaten, so long as Germany does not take French territory 
as distinct from the colonies." — (Sir Edward Grey, in British Blue 
Booh, No. 101; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 77. Compare Ger- 
many 's attitude towards Great Britain 's proposal for a compact in 
1912— see ch. i, IV 6 c.) 

The proposals of July 29 may be regarded as "the first clear sign of a 
general conflict ; for they presumed the probability of a war with France 
in which Belgium, and perhaps England, might be involved, while Holland 
would be left alone." — (J. H. Rose, Development of the European Nations, 
5th ed., II, p. 387.) 

6. Grey holds out the prospect of a League of Peace (July 30). In his reply 

to the foregoing proposals, the British Foreign Secretary adds : 

"If the peace of Europe can be preserved, and the present crisis safely 
passed, my own endeavor will be to promote some arrangement to which 
Germany could be a party, by which she could be assured that no aggres- 
sive or hostile policy would be pursued against her or her allies by France „ 



BELGIUM AND GREAT BRITAIN 45 

Russia, and ourselves, jointly or separately. I have desired this and 
worked for it, as far as I could, through the last Balkan crisis, and, 
Germany having a corresponding object, our relations sensibly improved. 
The idea has hitherto been too Utopian to form the subject of definite pro- 
posals, but if this present crisis, so much more acute than any that Europe 
has gone through for generations, be safely passed, I am hopeful that 
the relief and reaction which will follow may make possible some more 
definite rapprochement between the Powers than has been possible 
hitherto."— (British Blue Book, No. 101; Collected Diplomatic Docu- 
ments, p. 78.) 

Germany made no reply to the above suggestion. 

7. Great Britain not to come in if Russia and France rejected reasonable 

peace proposals; otherwise she would aid France. (July 31). 

"I said to German ambassador this morning that if Germany could 
get any reasonable proposal put forward which made it clear that Ger- 
many and Austria were striving to preserve European peace, and that 
Russia and France would be unreasonable if they rejected it, I would 
support it at St. Petersburg and Paris, and go the length of saying that if 
Russia and France would not accept it His Majesty's Government would 
have nothing more to do with the consequences ; but, otherwise, I told 
German ambassador that if France became involved we should be 
drawn in." — (Sir Edward Grey, in British Blue Book, No. Ill ; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 86.) 

8. Would Great Britain keep out if Germany respected Belgium's neutrality? 

(August 1.) 

"He [the German ambassador] asked me [Sir Edward Grey] whether, 
if Germany gave a promise not to violate Belgium's neutrality, we would 
engage to remain neutral. 

"I replied that I could not say that; our hands were still free, and we 
were considering what our attitude should be. All I could say was that 
our attitude would be determined largely by public opinion here, and that 
the neutrality of Belgium would appeal very strongly to public opinion 
here. I did not think that we could give a promise of neutrality on that 
condition alone. 

"The ambassador pressed me as to whether I could not formulate con- 
ditions on which we would remain neutral. He even suggested that the 
integrity of France and her colonies might be guaranteed. 

"I said that I felt obliged to refuse definitely any promise to remain 
neutral on similar terms, and I could only say that we must keep our 
hands free." — (British Blue Book, No. 123 ; Collected Diplomatic Docu- 
ments, p. 93.) 

9. Great Britain gives Naval assurance to France (August 2), following the 

German declaration of war on Russia (August 1) and the invasion of 
Luxemburg. 

"I am authorized [by the British Cabinet] to give an assurance that, 
if the German fleet comes into the Channel or through the North Sea to 



46 THE GREAT WAR 

undertake hostile operations against French coasts or shipping, the 
British fleet will give all the protection in its power." — (Sir Edward 
Grey to the French ambassador, in British Blue Book, No. 148; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 105.) 

This assurance was given as the result of an arrangement of several 
years' standing whereby the French fleet was concentrated in the Mediter- 
ranean and the British in the North Sea. "It did not bind us to go to 
war with Germany unless the German fleet took the action indicated." — 
(Sir Edward Grey to the British ambassador at Paris, in British Blue 
Book, No. 148; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 105.) 

IIL Neutrality of Luxemburg and of Belgium Violated 

1 . Luxemburg invaded by German troops (August 2) . This was in violation 

of the Treaty of London (1867), as well as of her rights as a neutral State 
in general. — (See Hague Convention of 1907, Articles 2-5; War Cyclo- 
pedia, under 'Luxemburg,' 'Neutral Duties,' 'Neutrality,' 'Neutralized 
State.') 

2. Special status of Belgium as a Neutralized State. Based upon the Treaty 

of London (1839), by which Belgium became "an independent and per- 
petually neutral State, . . . bound to observe such neutrality towards all 
other States," and Prussia, France, Great Britain, Austria, and Russia 
became the "guarantors " of her neutrality. The German Empire was the 
successor to Prussia in this guaranty. Confirmation of Belgium's 
neutrality in 1870, by treaties between Great Britain and Prussia and 
Great Britain and France. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Belgium, 
Neutralization . ' ) 

"Had Belgium been merely a small neutral nation, the crime [of her 
violation] would still have been one of the worst in the history of the 
modern world. The fact that Belgium was an internationalized State 
has made the invasion the master tragedy of the war. For Belgium 
represented what progress the world had made towards cooperation . If it 
could not survive, then no internationalism was possible. That is why, 
through these years of horror upon horror, the Belgian horror is the 
fiercest of all. The burning, the shooting, the starving, and the robbing 
of small and inoffensive nations is tragic enough. But the German crime 
in Belgium is greater than the sum of Belgium's misery. It is a crime 
against the basis of faith on which the world must build or perish." — 
(Walter Lippman, in Annals of the American Academy of Political and 
Social Science, July, 1917). 

3. German reassurances to Belgium in 1911 and 1914. 

' ' Germany will not lose sight of the fact that the neutrality of Belgium 
is guaranteed by international treaty." — (German Minister of War, in 
the Reichstag, April 29, 1911. 'See Belgian Grey Book, No. 12; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 306.) 

"The troops will not cross Belgian territory." — (German minister to 



BELGIUM AND GREAT BRITAIN 47 

Belgium, early on August 2, 1914, to Brussels journalists. In H. Davig- 
non, Belgium and Germany, p. 7.) 

"Up to the present he [the German minister to Belgium, on August 2] 
had not been instructed to make us an official communication, but that 
we knew his personal opinion as to the feelings of security which we had 
the right to entertain towards our eastern neighbors." — (Belgian Minister 
for Foreign Affairs, in Belgian Grey Book, No. 19 ; Collected Diplomatic 
Documents, p. 309.) 

4. France officially assured Great Britain and Belgium of her resolve to 

respect Belgium's neutrality (July 31 and August 1), in response to an 
inquiry addressed by Great Britain to both France and Germany. — 
(British Blue Book, No. 115 and 125 ; BelgianGrey Book, No. 15 ; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, pp. 87, 94, 307.) 

5. Germany declined to give such an official assurance (July 31) — apparently 

on the ground that "any reply they might give could not but disclose a 
certain amount of their plan of campaign in the event of war ensuing." — 
(British Blue Book, No. 122; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 92.) 

6. Germany demanded (August 2 at 7.00 p.m.) permission to pass through 

Belgium on the way to France, alleging (falsely) that France intended to 
march into Belgium, and offering to restore Belgium and to pay an 
indemnity at the end of the war. Should Belgium oppose the German 
troops, she would be considered "as an enemy," and Germany would 
"undertake no obligations" towards her. — (Belgian Grey Book, No. 20; 
Collected Diplomatic Documents, pp. 309-311.) 

7. Belgium refused such permission (August 3). "The Belgian Government, 

if they were to accept the proposals submitted to them, would sacrifice 
the honor of the nation and betray their duty towards Europe."— 
(Belgian Grey Book, No. 22; Collected Diplomatic Documents, p. 312.) 

8. German armed forces entered Belgium on the morning of August 4. 

Belgium thereupon appealed to Great Britain, France, and Russia, as 
guaranteeing Powers, to come to her assistance in repelling the invasion. 

9. Germany's justification of her action. 

(a) Plea of necessity. 

"Gentlemen, we are now in a state of necessity, and necessity knows 
no law. Our troops have occupied Luxemburg and perhaps have already 
entered Belgian territory. Gentlemen, this is a breach of international 
law. . . . We know . . . that France stood ready for an invasion 
[this statement was false]; France could wait, we could not. . . . The 
wrong — I speak openly — the wrong we thereby commit we will try to 
make good as soon as our military aims have been attained. He who is 
menaced as we are and is fighting for his highest possession can only 
consider how he is to hack his way through." — (Chancellor von Bethmann 
Hollweg, in the Reichstag, August 4, 1914. See War Cyclopedia, under 
'Bethman Hollweg,' Tvriegs-Raison,' 'Notwendigkeit.') 



48 THE GREAT WAR 

(b) Charge that Belgium had violated her own neutrality by concluding- 
military conventions with England in 1905 and 1912 directed 
against Germany . 

This claim is based on a willful misinterpretation of documents in the 
Belgian military archives. In view of the fact that Germany's strategic 
railways and her openly discussed military plans contemplated an attack 
on France through Belgium, the latter State was clearly within her rights 
in discussing measures which admittedly would only be taken in case of 
German attack upon her. — (Collected Diplomatic Documents, pp. 350-367.) 

"That a wrong was done to Belgium was originally openly confessed 
by the perpetrator. As an after-thought, in order to appear whiter, Cain 
blackened Abel. In my opinion it was a spiritual blunder to rummage for 
documents in the pockets of the quivering victim. ... To calumniate 
her in addition is really too much." — (Karl Spitteler, a Swiss, quoted in 
I Accuse, p. 234.) 

(c) Military expediency was the real reason. This is shown, among other 
indications, by an interview (August 3, 1914) between the German 
Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Belgian minister to Germany: 

Foreign Minister: "It is a question of life or death for the Empire. 
If the German armies do not want to be caught between the hammer and 
the anvil they must strike a decisive blow at France, in order then to turn 
back against Russia." 

Belgian Minister: ' ' But the frontiers of France are sufficiently extended 
to make it possible to avoid passing through Belgium." 

Foreign Minister: "They are too strongly fortified." — (H. Davignon, 
Belgium and Germany, p. 14.) 

"The plan for the invasion of France had been clearly settled for a 
long time. It had to be pursued with success in the north through 
Belgium, thus avoiding.the strong line of delaying forts which the enemy 
[France] had made to defend its frontiers towards Germany, and which 
would have been extremely difficult to break through." — (Deutsche 
Krieger Zeitung, September 2, 1914.) 



IV. Great Britain Enters the War 

1 . Appeal of King Albert of Belgium to King George (August 3) . " Remember- 

ing the numerous proofs of your Majesty's friendship and that of your 
predecessor, and the friendly attitude of England in 1870 and the proof 
of friendship you have just given us again, I make a supreme appeal to the 
diplomatic intervention of your Majesty's Government to safeguard the 
integrity of Belgium." — (Belgian Grey Book, No. 25; Collected Diplo- 
matic Documents, p. 313.) 

2. Great Britain's ultimatum to Germany (August 4) asking assurance by 

midnight that ' ' the demand made upon Belgium will not be proceeded with 
and that her neutrality will be respected by Germany." — (British Blue 
Book, No. 153, 159; Collected Diplomatic Documents, pp. 107-109.) 



BELGIUM AND GREAT BRITAIN 49 

3. War declared by Great Britain (about midnight, August 4). The "scrap 

of paper" utterance. 

The account of the last interview (about 7.00 p.m., August 4) of the 
British ambassador with the German Chancellor is instructive: "I 
found the Chancellor very agitated. His Excellency at once began a 
harangue, which lasted for about twenty minutes. He said that the step 
taken by His Majesty's Government was terrible to a degree ; just for a 
word — 'Neutrality,' a word which in war time had so often been dis- 
regarded — just for a scrap of paper Great Britain was going to make war 
on a kindred nation who desired nothing better than to be friends with 
her. All his efforts in that direction had been rendered useless by this 
last terrible step, and the policy to which, as I knew, he had devoted 
himself since his accession to office had tumbled _down like a house of 
cards. What we had done was unthinkable ; it was like striking a man from 
behind while he was fighting for his life against two assailants. He held 
Great Britain responsible for all the terrible events that might happen. 
I protested strongly against that statement, and said that, in the same " 
way as he and Herr von Jagow [German Foreign Minister] wished me to 
understand that for strategical reasons it was a matter of life and death 
to Germany to advance through Belgium and violate the latter's] neutrality , 
so I would wish him to understand that it was, so to speak, a matter of 
• life and death' for the honor of Great Britain that she should keep her 
solemn engagement to do her utmost to defend Belgium's neutrality if 
attacked. That solemn compact simply had to be kept, or what confidence 
could anyone have in engagements given by Great Britain in the future ? 
The Chancellor said, 'But at what price will that compact have been 
kept? Has the British Government thought of that?' I hinted to his 
Excellency as plainly as I could that fear of consequences could hardly 
be regarded as an excuse for breaking solemn engagements, but his Ex- 
cellency was so excited, so evidently overcome by the news of our action, 
and so little disposed to hear reason that I refrained from adding fuel to 
the flame by further argument." — {British Blue Book, No. 160; Collected 
Diplomatic Documents, p. 111. See War Cyclopedia, under 'Scrap of 
Paper.') 

4. Great Britain's reasons for entering the war. 

(a) Her obligations to Belgium under the treaty of 1839. 

(b) Her relations to France growing out of the Entente Cordiale (1904) . 
These ties were strengthened in subsequent years by consultations of 
British and French naval experts, but no promise of anything more 
than diplomatic support was given until August 2, 1914. 

"We have agreed that consultation between experts is not, and ought 
not, to be regarded as an engagement that commits either Government 
to action in any contingency that has not yet arisen and may never 
arise. The disposition, for instance, of the French and British fleets 
respectively at the present moment is not based upon an engagement to 
cooperate in war. 



50 THE GREAT WAR 

"You have, however, pointed out that, if either Government had grave 
reason to expect an unprovoked attack by a third Power, it might become 
essential to know whether it could in that event depend upon the armed 
assistance of the other. 

"I agree that, if either Government had grave reason to expect an 
unprovoked attack by a third Power, or something that threatened the 
general peace, it should immediately discuss with the other whether 
both Governments should act together to prevent aggression and to 
preserve peace, and if so, what measures they would be prepared to take 
in common." — (Sir Edward Grey to the French ambassador, November 
22, 1912; see New York Times Current History, I, p. 283.) 

"There is but one way in which the Government could make certain 
at the present moment of keeping outside this war, and that would be 
that it should immediately issue a proclamation of unconditional neu- 
trality. We cannot do that. We have made the commitment to France 
[of August 2, 1914] that I have read to the House which prevents us doing 
that." — (Sir Edward Grey in the House of Commons, August 3, 1914 ; 
New York Times Current History, I, p. 289.) 

(c) Self-interest — the realization that Germany's hostility to her was 
implacable, and that if Great Britain was not to surrender her 
position as a Great Power in the world, and possibly a goodly portion 
of her colonial possessions, she must ultimately fight Germany ; if so, 
better in alliance with France and Russia than alone at a later time. 

5. Great Britain's declared war aims. 

"We shall never sheathe the sword which we have not lightly drawn 
until Belgium recovers in full measure all and more than all that she has 
sacrificed, until France is adequately secured against the menace of aggres- 
sion, until the rights of the smaller nationalities of Europe are placed 
upon an unassailable foundation, and until military domination of Prussia 
is wholly and finally destroyed." — (Prime Minister Asquith, November 
9, 1914.) 

"I say nothing of what the actual conditions of peace will be, because 
those are things which we must discuss with our allies and settle in com- 
mon with them. But the great object to be attained ... is that there 
shall not again be this sort of militarism in Europe, which in time of peace 
causes the whole of the continent discomfort by its continual menace, 
and then, when it thinks the moment has come that suits itself, plunges 
the continent into war." — (Sir Edward Grey, House of Commons, 
January 26, 1916.) 

"What we and our allies are fighting for is a free Europe. We want a 
Europe free, not only from the domination of one nationality by another, 
but from hectoring diplomacy and the peril of war, free from the constant 
rattling of the sword in the scabbard, from perpetual talk of shining 
armor and war lords. In fact, we feel we are fighting for equal rights ; for 
law, justice, peace ; for civilization throughout the world as against brute 
force, which knows no restraint and no mercy. 



BELGIUM AND GREAT BRITAIN 51 

"What Prussia proposes, as we understand her, is Prussian supremacy. 
She proposes a Europe modeled and ruled by Prussia. She is to dispose 
of the liberties of her neighbors and of us all. We say that life on these 
terms is intolerable. And this also is what France and Italy and Russia 
say. We are fighting the German idea of the wholesomeness, almost the 
desirability, of ever recurrent war. Germany's philosophy is that a settled 
peace spells degeneracy . Such a philosophy , if it is to survive as a practical 
force, means eternal apprehension and unrest. It means ever-increasing 
armaments. It means arresting the development of mankind along the 
lines of culture and humanity. ... 

"The Allies can tolerate no peace that leaves the wrongs of this war 
unredressed. Peace counsels that are purely abstract and make no 
attempt to discriminate between the rights and the wrongs of this war 
are ineffective if not irrelevant. 

"... The Prussian authorities have apparently but one idea of peace, 
an iron peace imposed on other nations by German supremacy. They do 
not understand that free men and free nations will rather die than submit 
to that ambition, and that there can be no end to war till it is defeated 
and renounced." — (Sir Edward Grey, to correspondent of Chicago Daily 
News, in June, 1916.) 

V. Reading References 

Beck, J. M. The Evidence in the Case, ch. viii. 

Chitwood, O. P. Immediate Causes of the Great War, chs. vii-ix. 

De Visscher, C. Belgium's Case, chs. i-vi. 

Davis, M. O. The Great War-, chs. viii-ix. 

Davis, W. S. The Roots of the War (1918), ch. xxiv. 

Dillon, E. J. The Scrap of Paper, chs. ix-xi. 

Gibbons, H. A. The New Map of Europe, ch. xxi. 

McClure, S. S. Obstacles to Peace, ch. xiv. 

Maeterlinck, M. The Wrack of the Storm. 

Sarolea, C. How Belgium Saved Europe, chs. i-vii. 

Stowell, E. C. The Diplomacy of the War of 1914, chs. viii-ix. 

Waxweiler, E. Belgium, Neutral and Loyal, chs. i-iv. 

, Belgium and the Great Powers. 

Why We Are At War. By members of the Oxford Historical Faculty, 
ch. i. 



VII. THE WAR SPREADS : CHARACTER OF THE WAR 
I. Other States Enter the War 

1. Montenegro declares war (August 7, 1914), as an ally of Serbia. 

2. Japan declares war (August 23), because of — 

(a) Alliance with Great Britain (concluded in 1902 ; renewed in 1905 
and 1911). 

(b) Resentment at German ousting of Japan from Port Arthur in 1895, 
and German seizure of Kiao-Chau Bay (China) in 1897. Japanese 
ultimatum to Germany in 1914 modeled on that of Germany to 
Japan in 1895. 

(c) Japan captures Tsingtau, on Kiao-Chau Bay (November 17, 1914). 
Thenceforth her part in the military operations of the war was slight. 

3. Unneutral acts of Turkey (sheltering of German warships, bombardment 

of Russian Black Sea ports, October 29, etc.) lead to Allied declarations 
of war against her (November 3-5, 1914). It is now proved that Turkey 
was in alliance with Germany from August 4, 1914. — (See N. Y. Times 
Current History, November, 1917, p. 334-335.) 

4. Italy declares war on Austria, May 23, 1915* (on Germany, August 27, 

1916). Due in part to — 

(a) Italy's desire to complete her unification by acquiring from Austria 
the Italian-speaking Trentino and Trieste (Italia Irredenta). 

(b) Conflicts of interests with Austria on the Eastern shore of the 
Adriatic. 

(c) Austria-Hungary's violation of the Triple Alliance agreement by her 
aggressive policy in the Balkans. 

5. Bulgaria, encouraged by Russian and British reverses, and assured by 

Germany of the much coveted shore on the Aegean, makes an alliance with 
Austria and Germany and attacks Serbia (October 13, 1915). Great 
Britain, France, Russia, and Italy thereupon declared war on Bulgaria 
(October 16-19). Refusal of King Constantine of Greece to fulfill his 
treaty obligations to Serbia. 

6. Portugal drawn into the war (March 9, 1916) through her long-standing 

alliance with Great Britain. 

7. Roumania, encouraged by Allied successes early in 1916, and pressed 

thereto by Russia, attacks Austria-Hungary in order to gain Transylvania 
(August 27, 1916). 

8. Further spread of the war: United States declares war on Germany, 

April 6, 1917 (see chapter ix). — Greece deposes King Constantine (June 
12, 1917) and joins the Entente Allies. — Siam, China, and Brazil enter 

* The terms of the Pact of London which brought Italy into the war were first revealed by 
the Bolsheviki Government of Russia late in 1917 (see New York Evening Post, January 25, 
1918, and pamphlet issued by that paper), and more fully by Signor Bevione in March, 1918 
(see Associated Press despatches of March 26, 1918). 

52 



CHARACTER OF THE WAR 53 

the war against the Teutonic Allies ; Bolivia, Peru, Uruguay, Ecuador, 
etc., sever diplomatic relations with Germany. — (See War Cyclopedia, 
under 'War, Declarations of.') 

H. World-Wide Character and Importance of the Conflict 

1. The most widespread and terrible war in history. A score of countries 

involved ; compare the size of the belligerent areas and populations with 
those remaining neutral, of the states arrayed against Germany with 
those on her side. — (See map and charts in History Teacher's Magazine, 
for April, 1918.) 

"At least 38,000,000 men are bearing arms in the war — 27,500,000 
on the side of the world Allies and 10,600,000 on the side of the Central 
Powers — according to latest War Department compilations from pub- 
lished reports in various countries. These figures do not include naval 
personnel strength, which would raise the total several millions. Against 
Germany's 7,000,000, Austria's 3,000,000, Turkey's 300,000 and Bul- 
garia's 300,000, are arrayed the following armed forces: Russia, 9,000,- 
000; France, 6,000,000; Great Britain, 5,000,000; Italy, 3,000,000; 
Japan, 1,400,000; United States, more than 1,000,000; China, 541,000; 
Roumania, 320,000 ; Serbia, 300,000 ; Belgium, -300,000 ; Greece, 300,000 ; 
Portugal, 200,000; Montenegro, 40,000; Siam, 36,000; Cuba, 11,000, 
and Liberia, 400." — (Associated Press dispatch, October 22, 1917.) 

2. Universal disorganization of commerce and industry. Widespread suffering 

even in neutral countries. Problems of transportation, food-supply, coal, 
and other necessaries of life. Radical changes in government to deal with 
these problems ; great enlargement of government functions and control 
(State Socialism) . 

3. Importance of the issues involved: Government of the world by negotia- 

tion, arbitration, and international law, vs. reliance upon military force 
and the principle that "might makes right." — Humanity vs. "fright- 
fulness." — Democracy and freedom vs. autocracy and slavery. 

4. Extraordinary stimulation of hatred in Germany for her opponents, 

especially the English. Ernest Lissauer's "Chant of Hate" (in Oat of 
Their Own Mouths and elsewhere) ; "Gott strafe England " as a greeting. 
"Education to hate. Education to the estimation of hatred. Educa- 
tion to the desire for hatred. Let us abolish unripe and false shame before 
brutality and fanaticism. We must not hesitate to announce: To us is 
given faith, hope, and hatred ; but hatred is the greatest among them." — 
(Dr. Fuchs, quoted in J. M. Beck, The Evidence in the Case, pp. 11-12.) 

III. Innovations in Warfare Due to the Progress of Science and 
Invention 

1. New developments in trenches and trench fighting. Vast and complicated 
systems of deep and narrow trenches, inter-communicating ; underground 
refuge chambers of timber and concrete ; elaborate barbed wire entangle- 



54 THE GREAT WAR 

ments; shell craters, occupied by "snipers," and fortified "pill- 
boxes" of steel and concrete as gun emplacements. Defended by men 
with magazine rifles and machine guns ; use of hand grenades, trench 
mortars, sapping and mining; steel helmets and gas masks. " Camou- 
flage," the art of concealment. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Barbed- 
wire Entanglements,' 'Camouflage,' 'Trench Warfare,' etc.) 

2. Great guns (German 42-centimeter howitzers, etc.) used to smash old 

fashioned steel and concrete fortifications and bombard towns twenty- 
two miles distant. Enormous quantities of high explosive shell, fired by 
thousands of guns, for days at a time, used to destroy wire entanglements 
and trenches. "Barrage" (barrier) shell-fire used to cover or ward off 
attack; definition and use of "creeping barrage"; excellence of French 
"75's" (quick-fire cannon with caliber of 75 millimeters — about three 
inches); British "tanks" (huge caterpillar motors, armored and armed 
with machine guns and rapid-fire cannon) ; poison gas and liquid fire ; 
etc., etc. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Barrage,' 'Forbidden Methods of 
Warfare,' 'Gas Warfare,' 'Shells,' 'Tanks,' etc.) 

3. Great development of airplanes for scouting, directing artillery fire, etc. 

Use of captive balloons. Zeppelins used mainly for dropping bombs on 
undefended British and French towns ; their failure to fulfill German 
expectations. Devices for combating air attacks. — (See War Cyclo- 
pedia, under 'Aviation,' etc.) 

4. Great development of the submarine and submarine warfare. Use of 

submarines against warships perfectly legitimate; employment against 
merchant shipping also entirely proper under certain limitations, but these 
limitations practically impossible to observe. Devices for combating 
submarines. — (See War Cyclopedia under 'Submarine,' 'Submarine 
Warfare, Legal Impracticability,' etc.) 

5. New problems of transport and communication. Great use of motor trucks 

and automobiles for moving troops and supplies ; increased difficulties 
of supply owing to vast numbers of soldiers engaged, and enormous 
quantities of shells fired. Use of wireless telegraph and telephone. — (See 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Motor Transport.') 

6. Mobilization of civilian population in all countries and national control of 

industry, food production and consumption. Increased participation of 
women in war work. In this conflict not merely armies but nations 
are engaged against one another; and the side with the greatest man- 
power, the best organized production and consumption, the largest 
financial resources, the staunchest courage and the closest cooperation 
between its allies will win. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Civilian Tasks,' 
'Food Control,' 'Fuel Control,' etc.) 

IV. Examples of German Ruthlessness and Violations of International 

Law 
1. War from the standpoint of International Law. 

"From the standpoint of the international jurist, war is not merely a 



CHARACTER OF THE WAR 55 

national struggle between public enemies, but a condition of juridical 
status under which such a conflict is carried on. It consists of certain 
legal rules and generally recognized customs, most of which have been 
codified and embodied in international treaties — the so-called Hague 
Conventions of 1899 and 1907 — which nearly all the members of the 
international community, including Germany, have signed and ratified. 
Now, if we were to take up the Hague Regulations in detail, we should 
find that Germany has violated again and again practically all of them. 
A bare list or enumeration of the proved and well authenticated instances 
of violation of international law by Germany in this war would, in fact, 
fill many volumes. If these were accompanied by some description or 
commentary, I verily believe that the Encyclopedia Britannica would not 
contain all of them."— (Prof. A. S. Hershey, in Indiana University 
Alumni Quarterly, October, 1917.) 

"Germany does not really wage war. She assassinates, massacres, 
poisons, tortures, intrigues ; she commits every crime in the calendar, 
such as arson, pillage, murder, and rape; she is guilty of almost every 
possible violation of international law and of humanity — and calls it 
war."- — (Ibid.) 

The German war philosophy. Conception of "absolute war " ; ruthlessness 
and " ^rightfulness" advocated as means of shortening war, and hence 
justified as really humane; doctrine that "military necessity" is para- 
mount over every other consideration. International law regarded as a 
selfish invention of weak States seeking to hamper the strong. Principle 
of "Deutschland uber Alles." 

"Whoever uses force without any consideration and without sparing 
blood, has sooner or later the advantage if the enemy does not proceed 
in the same way. One cannot introduce a principle of moderation into the 
philosophy of war without committing an absurdity. It is a vain and 
erroneous tendency to neglect the element of brutality in war merely 
because we dislike it." — (Karl von Clausewitz, Vom Kriege, I, page 4.) 

"War in the present day will have to be conducted more recklessly, 
less scrupulously, more violently, more ruthlessly, than ever in the past. 
. . . Every restriction on acts of war, once military operations have 
begun, tends to weaken the coordinated action of the belligerent. . . . 
The law of nations must beware of paralyzing military action by placing 
fetters upon it. . . . Distress and damage to the enemy are the con- 
ditions necessary to bend and break his will. . . . The combatant has 
need of passion. ... It requires that the combatant . . . shall be 
entirely freed from the shackles of a restraining legality which is in all 
respects oppressive." — (General von Hartmann, " Militarische Not- 
wendigkeit und Humanitat," in Deutsche Rundschau, XIV, pp. 76, 
119-122.) 

"Since the tendency of thought of the last century was dominated 
essentially by humanitarian considerations, which not infrequently 
degenerated into sentimentality and flabby emotion, there have not been 
wanting attempts to influence the development of the usages of war in 



56 THE GREAT WAR 

a way which was in fundamental contradiction with the nature of war 
and its object. Attempts of this kind will* also not be wanting in the 
future, the more so as these agitations have found a kind of moral recog- 
nition in some provisions of the Geneva Convention arid the Brussels 
and Hague Conferences. . . . The danger that in this way he [the officer] 
will arrive at false views about the essential character of war must not be 
lost sight of . . . . By steeping himself in military history an officer will 
be able to guard himself against excessive humanitarian notions ; it 
will teach him that certain severities are indispensable to war, nay more, 
that the only true humanity very often lies in a ruthless application of 
them. . . . 

"Every means of war without which the object of the war cannot be 
obtained is permissible. ... It follows from these universally valid 
principles that wide limits are set to the subjective freedom and arbitrary 
judgment of the commanding officer." — (Kriegsbrauch im Landkriege, 
official publication edited by the General Staff, in translation by J. H. 
Morgan, entitled The German War Booh, pp. 54-55, 64.) 

All the foregoing extracts are quoted in E. Lavisse and C. Andler, 
German Theory and Practice of War, pp. 25-29. See also, D. C. Munro, 
German War Practices, Introduction; War Cyclopedia, under 'Fright- 
fulness,' 'Kriegs-Raison,' 'Notwendigkeit,' 'War, German Ruthlessness,' 
'War, German View,' etc. ; Scott and Garner, German War Code. 

3. German treatment of Belgium and other occupied territories (Northern 
France, Russian Poland, Serbia, etc.). Evidence found in captured 
letters and diaries of German soldiers and in proclamations of German 
commanders, as well as in testimony of victims and witnesses. The viola- 
tions of international law and of the laws of humanity include : — 
(a) Deliberate and systematic massacre of portions of the civil popula- 
tion, as a means of preventing or punishing resistance. Individual 
citizens murdered (some while hostages) ; women abused, and chil- 
dren brutally slain. Thousands of persons were so killed, often 
with mutilation and torture. — (See Munro, German War Practices; 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Hostages,' 'Non-combatants,' etc.) 
"Outrages of this kind [against the lives and property of the civil 
population] were committed during the whole advance and retreat of the 
Germans through Belgium and France, and only abated when open 
maneuvering gave place to trench warfare along all the line from Switzer- 
land to the sea. Similar outrages accompanied the simultaneous advance 
into the western salient of Russian Poland, and the autumn incursion of 
the Austro-Hungarians into Serbia, which was turned back at Valievo. 
There was a remarkable uniformity in the crimes committed in these 
widely separated theaters of war, and an equally remarkable limit to the 
dates within which they fell. They all occured during the first three months 
of the war, while since that period, though outrages have continued, 
they have not been of the same character or on the same scale. This has 
not been due to the immobility of the fronts, for although it is certainly 
true that the Germans have been unable to overrun fresh territories on the 



CHARACTER OF THE WAR 57 

west, they have carried out greater invasions than ever in Russia and the 
Balkans, which have not been marked by outrages of the same specific 
kind. This seems to show that the systematic warfare against the civil 
population in the campaigns of 1914 was the result of policy, deliberately 
tried and afterwards deliberately given up." — (Arnold J. Toynbee, The 
German Terror in Belgium, pp. 15-16.) 

(b) Looting, burning of houses and whole villages, and wanton destruc- 
tion of property ordered and countenanced by German officers. 
Provision for systematic incendiarism was a part of German military 
preparations.- — (See Munro, German War Practices; Munro, German 
Treatment of Conquered Territory; War Cyclopedia, under 'Belgium, 
Estates Destroyed,' 'Belgium's Woe,' 'Family Honor and Rights 
of Property,' 'Pillage,' etc.) 

"It is forbidden to pillage a town or locality even when taken by 
assault . . . [In occupied territory] pillage is forbidden."- — (Hague 
Convention of 1907, Articles 28 and 47.) 

(c) Excessive taxes ($12,000,000 a month), and heavy fines on cities and 
provinces, laid upon Belgium. Belgium robbed of its industrial 
and agricultural machinery, together with its stocks of foodstuffs 
and raw materials, which were sent into Germany or converted to 
the use of the German army. This was according to a "plan elabor- 
ated by- Dr. W. Rathenau in 1914 at Berlin, for the systematic ex- 
ploitation of all the economic resources of occupied countries in 
favor of the military organization of the Empire." — (See Munro, 
German Treatment of Conquered Territory; War Cyclopedia, under 
'Belgium, Economic Destruction,' 'Contributions,' 'Requisitions.') 

"[1] Coal, minerals, metals, chemical products; wood and various 
building materials ; wool, flax, cotton and other materials for weaving ; 
leather, hides and rubber, all in every possible state of industrial trans- 
formation, from the raw material' to the commercial product and the 
waste; [2] further, all machines, fixed and movable, and machine-tools 
(in particular, the American lathes which it is impossible to replace at 
present) ; transmission belts ; wires for electric lighting and motor power ; 
oils and grease products ; [3] transport material, whether by road, railway 
or water, and an important part of the rolling-stock of local railway 
lines ; all traction power, whether animal or mechanical ; thoroughbreds 
and stud animals, and the products of breeding ; [4] agricultural products, 
seed and harvests, etc., — were successively immobilized, and then seized 
and removed from the country, as a result of legislative acts on the part 
of the civil authorities, following upon innumerable requisitions by the 
military authorities. The value of these seizures and requisitions 
amounts to billions of francs. . . . Moreover, many of the measures 
taken were inspired not only by the motives of military interest denounced 
above, but by the underlying thought of crushing the commercial rivalry 
of Belgium. This was explicitly admitted in Germany itself by several 
authorities." — {Memorandum of the Belgian Government on the Deporta- 
tions, etc., February 1, 1917, pp. 7-8.) 

The total exactions from Belgium, in money and materials, are com- 



58 THE GREAT WAR 

puted to be "in excess of one billion dollars , or nearly five times as much 
as all the world has contributed to keep the Belgian people from starving 
to death." — (S. S. McClure, Obstacles to Peace, page 116.) 

(d) Forcible deportation of tens of thousands of Belgian and other 
civilians to Germany, the men to serve practically as slaves in 
Germany's industries, and the women reduced frequently to worse 
than slavery. — (See Munro, German Treatment of Conquered Terri- 
tory; War Cyclopedia, under 'Belgium, Deportations.') 

"They [the Germans] have dealt a mortal blow to any prospect they 
may ever have had of being tolerated by the population of Flanders 
[which they were seeking to alienate from French-speaking Belgium] ; 
in tearing away from nearly every humble home in the land a husband 
and a father or a son and brother, they have lighted a fire of hatred that 
will never go out ; they have brought home to every heart in the land, 
in a way that will impress its horror indelibly on the memory of three 
generations, a realization of what German methods mean — not, as with 
the early atrocities, in the heat of passion and the first lust of war, but 
by one of those deeds that make one despair of the future of the human 
race, a deed coldly planned, studiously matured, and deliberately and 
systematically executed, a deed so cruel that German soldiers are said 
to have wept in its execution, and so monstrous that even German soldiers 
are now said to be ashamed. "---(U. S. Minister Brand Whitlock, in 
January, 1917.) 

(e) Fearful devastation of part of Northern France during Hindenburg 's 
"strategic retreat" (March, 1917), including complete destruction 
of villages and homesteads, systematic destruction of vineyards and 
fruit trees, etc. — -(See Munro, German Treatment of Conquered 
Territory; War Cyclopedia, under 'Destruction,' 'Frightfulness,' 
'Hindenburg Line.') 

"In the course of these last months, great stretches of French territory 
have been turned by us into a dead country. It varies in width from 10 
to 12 or 15 kilometers [6/i to 73^ or 9% miles], and extends along the 
whole of our new position, presenting a terrible barrier of desolation to 
any enemy hardy enough to advance against our new lines. No village 
or farm was left standing on this glacis, no road was left passable, no 
railway track or embankment was left in being. Where once were woods 
there are gaunt rows of stumps ; the wells have been blown up ; wires, 
cables, and pipelines destroyed. In front of our new positions runs, like a 
gigantic ribbon, an empire of death." — (Berlin Lokal Anzeiger, March 
18, 1917; quoted in Frightfulness in Retreat, page 5.) 

"Whole towns and villages have been pillaged, burnt and destroyed; 
private houses have been stripped of all their furniture, which the enemy 
has carried > off ; fruit trees have been torn up or rendered useless for all 
future production ; springs and wells have been poisoned. The com- 
paratively few inhabitants who were not deported to the rear were left 
with the smallest possible ration of food, while the enemy took possession 
of the stocks provided by the Neutral Relief Committee and intended for 



CHARACTER OF THE WAR 59 

the civil population . . . . It is a question not of acts aimed at hampering 
the operations of the Allied armies, but of acts of devastation which have 
no connection with that object, and the aim of which is to ruin for many 
years to come one of the most fertile regions of France." — (Protest of the 
French Government to Neutral Powers, in F rightfulness in Retreat, 
pp. 6-7.) 

(f) Wanton destruction of historic works of art — library of Louvain; 
cathedrals of Rheims, Soissons, Ypres, Arras, St. Quentin; castle 
of Coucy ; town halls, etc., of Ypres and other Belgian cities. — (See 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Louvain,' 'Rheims,' 'Works of Art.' etc.) 

(g) Similar devastation of Russian Poland and Serbia. 

"The Germans are intentionally bringing about a famine in the country 
[Russian Poland], in order to compel the male population to emigrate to 
Germany. . . . 

"A nation of seventy millions, being strong in arms but short of food, 
strips a country of twelve millions, which had fallen under its military 
domination, and leaves those twelve million people to starve. . . . There 
has been another purpose in the background that is viler still. . . . 
This 'crime of necessity,' however, was unfortunately the means of 
usurious profit to the agents employed in carrying it out. . . . 

"Her grand object is the permanent extirpation of Polish industry. 
The bombardment of Kalish and the wrecking of the Dombrova mines 
were true symptoms of what was to come .... First , all kinds of a uxiliary 
machines were taken away, turners' plant, metal cylinders, etc. For the 
textile industry of Lodz, a systematic confiscation of the metal cylinders, 
which it is very difficult to replace, spells ruin ; yet from the factory of 
Paznanski alone, ten railway trucks of them were removed. Secondly, 
the whole stock of raw materials was requisitioned from the factories ; 
first oil, leather, and sulphur, then iron, and finally the entire store of 
wool and cotton. . . . 

' ' Everything is done to make Poland a country without a future and to 
deepen the atmosphere of despair in town and country alike. The irre- 
placeable forests are being systematically cut down. . . . The Polish 
workman sees all turning to ruin around him, and the starvation of his 
wife and children is ever present with him at home." — (Arnold J. Toyn- 
bee, The Destruction of Poland.) 

"One-third of a generation, the youngest, has practically ceased to 
exist; the remaining youth, old men, and women are now upon the 
threshold of actual extinction by starvation, disease, and exposure." — 
(Telegram of Poles in America to Mr. Asquith, January 9, 1916.) 

4. Other violations of the laws of warfare on land. 

(a) Use of poison gas and liquid fire (both first used by the Germans) ; 
poisoning of wells; intentional dissemination of disease germs 
(anthrax and glanders, at Bucharest, etc.); bombardment of unde- 
fended towns by Zeppelins, airplanes, and cruisers; bombardment 
of hospitals, etc. — -(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Bombardment,' 



THE GREAT WAR 

'Explosives from Aircraft,' 'Forbidden Weapons/ 'Gas Warfare/ 
'Poisons,' 'Roumania, Germany Treachery in,' 'Zeppelins,' etc.) 

(b) Civilians, including women and children, used as a screen by German 
forces; frequent abuse of Red Cross and white flag. — (See Munro, 
German War Practices, under 'Hostages and Screens.') 

" 'We waited for the advance of the Germans,' states a British officer ; 
'some civilians reported to us that they were coming down a road in front 
of us. On looking in that direction we saw, instead of German troops, 
a crowd of civilians — men, women, and children — waving white handker- 
chiefs and being pushed down the road in front of a large number of 
German troops.' — 'They came on as it were in a mass,' states a British 
soldier, 'with the women and children massed in front of them. They 
seemed to be pushing them on, and I saw them shoot down women and 
children who refused to march. Up to this my orders had been not to 
fife, but when we saw women and children shot my sergeant said: "It 
is too heartrending," and gave orders to fire, which we did.' — 'I saw the 
Germans advancing on hands and knees towards our positions,' states 
another; 'they were in close formation, and had a fine of women and 
children in front of their front rank.. Our orders at that time were not 
to fire on civilians .in front of the enemy.' " — (Arnold J. Toynbee, The 
German Terror in France, pp. 6-7.) 

(c) Wounded and prisoners killed in many instances. — (See Munro, 
German War Practices; War Cyclopedia, under 'Hun,' 'Prisoners of 
War,' 'Quarter/ etc.) 

"28th August. — They [the French] lay in heaps of eight or ten wounded 
or dead on top of one another. Those who could still walk we made prison- 
ers and brought them with us. Those who were seriously wounded, in the 
head or lungs, etc., and who could not stand upright, were given one more 
bullet, which put an end to their life. Indeed, that was the order which 
we had received."— (Diary of a German soldier, in Joseph Bedier, How 
Germany seeks to Justify her Atrocities, p. 45.) 

"By leaps and bounds we got across the clearing. They were here, 
there, and everywhere hidden in the thicket. Now it is down with the 
enemy! And we will give them no quarter. . . . We knock down or 
bayonet the wounded, for we know that those scoundrels fire at our 
backs when we have gone by. There was a Frenchman there stretched 
out, full length, face down, pretending to be dead. A kick from a strong 
fusilier soon taught him that we were there. Turning round he asked for 

quarter, but we answered: 'Is that the way your tools work, you ,' 

and he was nailed to the ground . Close to me I heard odd cracking sounds . 
They were blows from a gun on the bald head of a Frenchman which a 
private of the 154th was dealing our vigorously ; he was wisely using a 
French gun so as not to break his own. Tender-hearted souls are so kind 
to the French wounded that they finish them with a bullet, but others 
give them as many thrusts and blows as they can. "—(Article entitled 
"A Day of Honor for our Regiment— 24th September, 1914," in the 



CHARACTER OF THE WAR 61 

Jauresches Tageblatt, 18th October, 1914 ; facsimile in Joseph Bedier, 
German Atrocities from German Evidence, pp. 32-33.) 

"After today no more prisoners will be taken. All prisoners are to be 
killed. Wounded, with or without arms, are to be killed. Even prisoners 
already grouped in convoys are to be killed. Let not a single living enemy 
remain behind us." — (Order given 26th August, 1914, by General Stenger, 
of the 58th German Brigade ; testified to by numerous German prisoners. 
See Bedier, German Atrocities, pp. 28-29, 39-40.) 

' ' When you meet the foe you will defeat him . No quarter will be given , 
no prisoners will be taken. Let all who fall into your hands be at your 
mercy. Just as the Huns a thousand years ago, under the leadership of 
Etzel [Attila], gained a reputation in virtue of which they still live in 
historical tradition, so may the name of Germany become known in 
such a manner in China that no Chinaman will ever again dare to look 
askance at a German." — (Speech of the Kaiser to German troops em- 
barking for the Boxer War in 1900 ; reported in Bremen Weser Zeitung 
and in other German newspapers ; quoted in London Times, July 30, 1900.) 

"It is forbidden . . . to kill or wound an enemy who, having laid down 
his arms and having no means of self-defense, gives himself up as a 
prisoner ; to declare that no quarter will be given." — (Hague Convention 
of 1907, Article 23.) 

(d) Inhuman treatment of British captives in German prison camps, 
at Wittenberg and elsewhere. — (See Munro, German War Practices; 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Prisoners of War,' etc.) The British treat- 
ment of German prisoners, on the other hand, was humane and 
correct. 

Submarine warfare waged in disregard of international law. Sinking with- 
out warning of the Falaba, Cushing, Gulflight, Lusitania, Arabic, Sussex, 
etc. ; ruthless destruction of lives of innocent men, women, and children. 
Great extension of submarine warfare after February 1, 1917. Policy of 
"sinking without leaving a trace" (spurlos versenkt). Instructions to 
sink even hospital ships. Utter disregard of the rights of neutrals. — (See 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Lusitania Notes,' 'Submarine Warfare,' 'Spurlos 
Versenkt,' 'Visit and Search,' etc., and under names of vessels.) 

' ' The new policy has swept every restriction aside . Vessels of every kind, 
whatever their flag, their character, their cargo, their destination, their 
errand, have been ruthlessly sent to the bottom, without warning and 
without thought of help or mercy for those on board, the vessels of friendly 
neutrals along with those of belligerents." — (President Wilson, speech 
of April 2, 1917.) 

Practical extermination of the Armenian nation by the Turks, evidently 
with German sanction (1915-16) . — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Armenian 
Massacres.') 

"In order, I was told, to cover the extermination of the Armenian 
nation with a political cloak, military reasons were being put forward, 
which were said to make it necessary to drive the Armenians out of their 



62 THE GREAT WAR 

native seats, which had been theirs for 2,500 years, and to deport them 
to the Arabian deserts. I was also told that individual Armenians had 
lent themselves to acts of espionage. 

"After I had informed myself about the facts and had made inquiries 
on all sides, I came to the conclusion that all these accusations against 
the Armenians were, in fact, based on trifling provocations, which were 
taken as an excuse for slaughtering 10,000 innocents for one guilty person, 
for the most savage outrages against women and children, and for a 
campaign of starvation against the exiles which was intended to extermi- 
nate the whole nation. . . . 

"Out of convoys which, when they left their homes on the Armenian 
plateau, numbered from two to three thousand men, women and children, 
only two or three hundred survivors arrive here in the south. The men 
are slaughtered on the way ; the women and girls, with the exception of 
the old, the ugly, and those who are still children, have been abused by 
Turkish soldiers and officers and then carried away to Turkish and Kurdish 
villages, where thay have to accept Islam. They try to destroy the rem- 
nant of the convoys by hunger and thirst. Even when they are fording 
rivers, they do not allow those dying of thirst to drink. All the nourish- 
ment they receive is a daily ration of a little meal sprinkled over their 
hands, which they lick off greedily, and its only effect is to protract their 
starvation." — (Dr. Martin Niepage, The Horrors of Aleppo, Seen by a 
German Eyewitness, pp. 3-6.) 

V. Summary and Explanation of German Policy 

(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Der Tag,' 'German Military Autocracy,' 
'Hegemony, German Ambition,' 'War, Responsibility for.') 

"The German Government wages the war by methods which, judged 
even by standards till now conventional, are monstrous. Note, for 
example, the sudden attack upon Belgium and Luxemburg; poison gas, 
since adopted by all the belligerents; but most outrageous of all, the 
Zeppelin bombings, inspired with the purpose of annihilating every living 
person, combatant or non-combatant, over large areas; the submarine 
war on commerce; the torpedoing of the Lusitania, etc.; the system of 
taking hostages and levying contributions, especially at the outset in 
Belgium ; the systematic exactions from Ukrainian, Georgian, Cour- 
lander, Polish, Irish, Mohammedan, and other prisoners of war in the 
German prison camps, of treasonable war-service, and of treasonable 
espionage for the Central Powers ; the contract between Under-Secretary 
of State Zimmermann and Sir Roger Casement in December, 19 14, for the 
organization, equipment, and training of the 'Irish Brigade' made up of 
imprisoned British soldiers in the German prison camps ; the attempts 
under threats ^by forced internment to compel enemy alien civilians found 
in Germany to perform treasonable war service against their own country, 
etc. 'Necessity knows no law.' " — (Dr. Karl Liebknecht, the German 
Socialist leader, in leaflet dated May 3, 1916. See War Cyclopedia, under 
'Liebknecht on German War Policy.') 



CHARACTER OF THE WAR 63 

"The war was begun and these crimes against humanity were done 
because Germany was pursuing the hereditary policy of the Hohenzollerns 
and following the instincts of the arrogant military caste which rules 
Prussia, to grasp the overlordship of the civilized world and establish an 
empire in which she should play the role of ancient Rome . They were done 
because Prussian militarism still pursues the policy of power through con- 
quest, of aggrandizement through force and fear, which in little more 
than two centuries has brought the puny Mark of Brandenburg with 
its million and a half of people to the control of a vast empire — the 
greatest armed force of the modern world." — (Ex-Senator Elihu Root, 
speech in Chicago, September 14, 1917.) 

VI. Reading References 

Bland, J. O. P. (Trans.) Germany's Violations of the Laws of War, 

1914-15. Compiled under the auspices of the French Ministry of 

Foreign Affairs. 
Chesterton, G. K. The Barbarism of Berlin. 
Chitwood, O. P. Immediate Causes of the Great War, chs. x-xii. 
Chambery, Rene. The Truth About Louvain (1916). 
Cobb, Irvin S. Speaking of Prussians (1917). 
Crimes of Germany, The. Special supplement issued by the Field 

newspaper, London. 
Dillon, E. J. From the Triple to the Quadruple Alliance, Why Italy 

Went to War; 
Gardiner, J. B. W. How Germany is Preparing for the Next War. 

(In World's Work, February, 1918.) 
McClure, S. S. Obstacles to Peace, chs. viii-xi, xv, xvi, xviii, xx. 
Johnson, R. The Clash of Nations, chs. iii-viii. 
Mokvoeld, L. The German Fury in Belgium. 
Morgan, J. H. German Atrocities, an Official Investigation. 
Munro, D. C. German War Practices. (Committee on Public Informa- 
tion.) 
. German Treatment of Conquered Territory. (Committee 

on Public Information.) 
Reports on the Violations of the Rights of Nations and of the Laws and 

Customs of War in Belgium. By a Commission appointed by the 

Belgian Government. 2 vols. 
Their Crimes. Translated from the French (by the Prefect of Meurth- 

et-Moselle and the mayors of Nancy and Luneville), 1917. 
Toynbee, A. J. The German Terror in Belgium. 

. The German Terror in France. 

. The Destruction of Poland. 

Turczynowicz, Laura de. When the Prussians Came to Poland. 
Waxweiller, E. Belgium, Neutral and Loyal, ch. v. 



VHI. THE UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR 
I. Struggle to Maintain Our Neutrality (1914-16) 

1 . American opinion at the outbreak of the war confused as to merits and issues 

in the controversy ; conflicting sympathies of hyphenated groups. — (See 
War Cyclopedia under 'Hyphenated Americans,' 'United States, Isola- 
tion,' 'United States, Neutrality, 1914-17.') 

2. Declaration of Neutrality of the United States, issued August 4, 1914. 

President Wilson's appeal for neutrality of sentiment. (August 18, 1914.) 
"Every man who really loves America will act and speak in the true spirit 
of neutrality, which is the spirit of impartiality and fairness and friendli- 
ness to all concerned. ... It will be easy to excite passion and difficult 
to allay it." He expressed the fear that our Nation might become divided 
into camps of hostile opinion. "Such divisions among us . . . might 
seriously stand in the way of the proper performance of our duty as the 
one great nation at peace, the one people holding itself read3^ to play a 
part of impartial mediation and speak counsels of peace and accommoda- 
tion, not as a partisan, but as a friend." — (See War Cyclopedia, under 
'United States, Neutrality, 1914-17,') 

3. Alienation of American sentiment from Germany and Austria. Invasion 

of Belgium generally condemned ; admiration for her plucky resistance 
and horror at German atrocities ; Cardinal Mercie'r's pastoral letter of 
Christmas, 1914 ; Commission for Relief in Belgium under American direc- 
tion (Mr. Herbert C. Hoover) ; Germany's monstrous crime in sinking 
the LusitaiUa; execution of Edith Cavell and Captain Fryatt. — (See 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Atrocities,' 'Belgium's Woe,' 'Cavell, Edith/ 
'Fryatt, Captain,' 'Lusitania,' 'Mercier, Cardinal,' etc.) 

4. Was the neutrality of our Government a real neutrality ? Lack of interest in 

the contest or of desire on the part of the people for the triumph of one 
or the other of the participants not necessary to neutrality of the Govern- 
ment. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Neutrality,' 'Neutral Rights,' etc.) 

5. Controversies with Great Britain: Over questions of blockade, contraband, 

and interference with our mails. Question of the applicability to the 
present emergency of the Declaration of London (drawn up in 1909 on the 
initiation of Great Britain, but not ratified before the war by a sufficient 
number of governments to be reckoned a part of the accepted law of 
nations). Property rights alone involved in these controversies, which 
could be settled after the war by our existing arbitration treaty with Great 
Britain. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Blacklist,' 'Blockade,' 'Declara- 
tion of London,' 'Embargo, British,' 'Mails, British Interference with,' 
'War Zone, British,' etc.) 

6. Controversies with Germany: Over our supplying munitions to the Allies 

and her submarine sinkings (Falaba, Cashing, Guljlight, Lusitania 

64 



UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR 65 

Arabic, etc.)- Intrigues and conspiracies in the United States; the 
Austro-Hungarian ambassador, and the German attaches Boy-Ed and 
von Papen, dismissed by our Government (November 4, 1915) on clear 
proof of guilt, but no apologies to us or reprimand to them issued by their 
Governments. German intrigues against us in Cuba, Haiti, San Domingo, 
Mexico, etc. — For a defense of our policy in permitting sale of munitions, 
etc., see letter of Secretary of State W. J. Bryan to Senator Stone, 
January 20, 1915 (in International Conciliation, No. 96) . — (See War Cyclo- 
pedia, under 'Der Tag — When?,' 'Dumba,' 'German Intrigue,' 'Igel, 
von, Papers of,' 'German Government, Moral Bankruptcy of,' 'Manila 
Bay, Dewey and Diedrichs at,' 'Monroe Doctrine, German Attitude,' 
'Intrigue,' 'Munitions,' 'Papen,' 'Sabotage,' 'Spies,' 'Strict Account- 
ability,' 'Submarine Blockade,' 'Submarine Warfare,' 'Parole,' War 
Zone, German,' and under names of vessels, etc.) 

Apparent settlement of the submarine controversy in May, 1916. — Sinking 
of the channel passenger ship Sussex without warning on March 24, 1916, 
after months of expostulation, precipitates a crisis. Our demand that 
thenceforth Germany conduct her submarine warfare in accordance with 
international law, by (a) warning vessels before sinking them, and (b) 
placing passengers and crew in safety. Germany's conditional agreement 
to comply with this demand ends the crisis. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 
'Submari^ Warfare, American Lives Lost,' 'Submarine Warfare, German 
Defense,' 'Submarine Warfare, Illegalities,' 'Submarine Warfare, 
Stages of,' 'Sussex,' 'Sussex Ultimatum,' 'Sussex Ultimatum, German 
Pledge,' etc.) 

Unceasing German intrigues against the United States. A semi-official 
list of intrigues charged against the German Government, based on oneset 
only of Gorman documents seized by our Government (the von Igel 
papers), includes the following: "Violation of the laws of the United 
States ; destruction of lives and property in merchant vessels on the high 
seas ; Irish revolutionary plots against Great Britain ; fomenting ill feeling 
against the United States in Mexico ; subornation of American writers and 
lecturers ; financing of propaganda ; maintenance of a spy system under 
the guise of a commercial investigation bureau ; subsidizing of a bureau 
for the purpose of stirring up labor troubles in munition plants ; the bomb 
industry and other related activities." Since our entrance into the war 
a vast amount of evidence as to Germany's treacherous and hostile in- 
trigues on our soil has come into the possession of our Government. — (See 
E. E. Sperry, German Plots and Intrigues, published by the Committee 
on Public Information, and War Cyclopedia, under 'German Intrigue,' 
'Igel, von, Papers of,' 'Parole,' 'Passports, German Frauds,' etc.) 

"From the very outset of the present war it has filled our unsuspecting 
communities and even our offices of government with spies and set 
criminal intrigues everywhere afoot against our national unity of counsel, 
our peace within and without, our industries and our commerce. Indeed, 
it is now evident that its spies were here even before the war began ; and 
it is unhappily not a matter of conjecture but a fact proved in our courts 



66 THE GREAT WAR 

of justice that the intrigues which have more than once come perilously 
near to disturbing the peace and dislocating the industries of the country 
have been carried on at the instigation, with the support, and even under 
the personal direction of official agents of the Imperial German Govern- 
ment accredited to the Government of the United States." — (President 
Wilson, Speech of April 2, 1917.) 

"Of all the nations now extant, the Germans have spun the widest 
and stickiest web of intrigue. Lift a stone anywhere in the world, and 
a bloodsucking von Igel, a venomous von Luxburg, a scaly Bolo wriggles 
to cover. The urbane von Bernstorff, the ridiculous Zimmermann, the 
austere von Jagow, are successively exposed in the role of master spiders. 
High Germans and low Germans, all species and sub-species, are im- 
plicated in the vile business. How are the Germans to reconcile this fact 
with their pretensions to straightforward manliness, to self-conscious 
strength, to alone-with-God honesty? Was German directness never 
more than a cloak to crooked scheming?" — (New Republic, October 
13, 1917.) 

9. Reasons for our long enduring patience in dealing with Germany: (a) Hope 
that saner counsels might prevail in that country, (b) Our traditional 
sense of responsibility toward all the republics of the New World, (c) The 
desire, by keeping free from the conflict, more effectively to aid in restoring 
peace at its close. — (See War Cyclopedia, under ' Pan- Americanism/ 
'Permanent Peace/ 'Watchful Waiting,' etc.) 

II. From Neutrality to War (1916-17) 

1. Unsuccessful Peace overtures (December, 1916- January, 1917). Inde- 
pendent overtures by Germany (December 12, 1916), and by President 
Wilson (December 18). Answer of the Allies based on the reasonable 
idea of "Reparation, Restoration, and Security." Refusal of Germany 
to disclose her terms. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Peace Overtures, 
German, 1916/ 'Peace Terms, German Industrialists on,' 'Peace Terms, 
German Professors on/ etc.) 

"Boasting of German conquests, 'the glorious deeds of our armies/ 
the [German] note implanted in neutral minds the belief that it was the 
purpose of the Imperial German Government to insist upon such con- 
ditions as would leave all Central Europe imder German dominance and 
so build up an empire which would menace the whole liberal world. 
Moreover, the German proposal was accompanied by a thinly veiled 
threat to all neutral nations ; and from a thousand sources, official and 
unofficial, the word came to Washington that unless the neutrals used 
their influence to bring the war to an end on terms dictated from Berlin, 
Germany and her allies would consider themselves henceforth free from 
any obligations to respect the rights of neutrals. The Kaiser ordered the 
neutrals to exert pressure on the Entente to bring the war to an abrupt 
end, or to beware of the consequences. Clear warnings were brought 
to our Government that if the German peace move should not be success- 



UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR 67 

ful the submarines would be unleashed for a more intense and ruthless 
war upon all commerce." — {How the War Came to America, pp. 10-11. 
See War Cyclopedia, under 'German Military Dominance/ 'Mittel- 
Europa,' etc.) 

2. President Wilson outlined such a peace as the United States could join in 

guarantying (January 22, 1917). Favorable reception of these proposals 
in the Entente countries; lack of response in Germany. — (See War 
Cyclopedia, under 'Aim of the United States,' 'America, Creed,' 'Balance 
of Power,' 'League to Enforce Peace,' 'Permanent Peace, American 
Plan.') 

"No peace can last, or ought to last, which does not [1] recognize and 
accept the principle that governments derive all their just powers from 
the consent of the governed, and that no right anywhere exists to 
hand people about from sovereignty to sovereignty as if they were 
property. . . . 

"I am proposing, as it were, that the nations should with one accord 
adopt the doctrine of President Monroe as the doctrine of the world : 
that no nation should seek to extend its policy over any other nation or 
people, but that every people should be left free to determine its own 
policy, its own way of development, unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, 
the little along with the great and powerful. 

"I am proposing [2 J that all nations henceforth avoid entangling alli- 
ances which would draw them into competitions of power, catch them in 
a net of intrigue and selfish rivalry, and disturb their own affairs with in- 
fluences intruded from without. There is no entangling alliance in a con- 
cert of power. When all unite to act in the same sense and with the same 
purpose, all act in the common interest and are free to live their own lives 
under a common protection. 

"I am proposing . . . [3] that freedom of the seas which in inter- 
national conference after conference representatives of the United States 
have urged with the eloquence of those who are the convinced disciples 
of liberty ; and [4] that moderation of armaments which make of armies 
and navies a power for order merely, not an instrument of aggression or 
of selfish violence." 

[5] "Mere agreements may not make peace secure. It will be absolutely 
necessary that a force be created as a guarantor of the permanency of the 
settlement so much greater than the force of any nation now engaged or 
any alliance hitherto formed, or projected that no nation, no probable 
combination of nations, could face or withstand it. If the peace presently 
to be made is to endure, it must be a peace made secure by the organized 
major force of mankind." — (President Wilson, Speech to U. S. Senate, 
January 22, 1917.) 

3. The "Zimmermann note" falls into the hands of the United States Govern- 

ment (dated January 19, 1917 ; published through the Associated Press, 
February 28) . In this the German Secretary for Foreign Affairs secretly 
informs the German minister to Mexico of the German intention to repu- 



68 THE GREAT WAR 

diate the Sussex pledge, and instructs him to offer the Mexican Govern- 
ment New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona if Mexico will join with Japan 
in attacking the United States. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Zimmer- 
mann Note.') 

4. The German Government officially notifies the United States (January 31, 

1917) that "from February 1, 1917, sea traffic will be stopped with every 
available weapon and without further notice." This meant the renewal 
of ruthless submarine operations, in violation of the pledge given after 
the sinking of the Sussex. — (See War Cyclopedia, as above under 1-7, 
also under 'Submarine Warfare, Unrestricted.') 

"The German Chancellor . . . stated before the Imperial Diet that 
the reason this ruthless policy had not been earlier employed was simply 
because the Imperial Government had not then been ready to act. In 
brief, under the guise of friendship and the cloak of false promises, it had 
been preparing this attack."- — (Hoiu the War Came to America, p. 13.) 

5. German Ambassador to the United States dismissed and diplomatic 

relations severed (February 3, 1917). This act was not equivalent to a 
declaration of war. President Wilson in his speech to the Senate announc- 
ing it, distinguished sharply between the German Government and the 
German people. — -Failure of the German Government to recall its sub- 
marine order led the President to recommend to Congress (February 26) 
a policy of "armed neutrality." More than 500 out of 531 members of 
the two houses of Congress were ready and anxious to act.; but a "fili- 
buster" of a handful of "willful men" defeated the measure, by prolong- 
ing the debate until the expiration of the congressional session, on March 
4. — March 12, orders were finally issued to arm American merchant ships 
against submarines. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Armed Neutrality 
Adopted,' 'Diplomatic Immunity,' 'Prussian Treaties, Attempted Modi- 
fication of,' 'United States, Break with Germany,' 'United States, 
Neutrality, 1914-17,' etc.) 

8. President Wilson urges the recognition of a state of war with Germany 
(April 2). — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'United States, Break with 
Germany,' etc.) 

"... The present German submarine warfare against commerce is a 
warfare against mankind . It is a war against all nations . American ships 
have been sunk, American lives taken, in ways which it has stirred us 
very deeply to learn of, but the ships and people of other neutral and 
friendly nations have been sunk and overwhelmed in the waters in the 
same way. There has been no discrimination. The challenge is to all 
mankind. Each nation must decide for itself how it will meet it. . . . 
There is one choice we cannot make, we are incapable of making: we will 
not choose the path of submission and suffer the most sacred rights of our 
nation and our people to be ignored or violated. The wrongs against which 
we now array ourselves are no common wrongs ; they cut to the very roots 
of human life. 

"With a profound sense of the solemn and even tragical character of 
the step I am taking and of the^grave responsibilities which it involves, 



UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR 69 

but in unhesitating obedience to what I deem my constitutional duty, I 
advise that the Congress declare the recent course of the Imperial German 
Government to be in fact nothing less than war against the Government 
and people of the United States; that it formally accept the status of 
belligerent which has thus been thrust upon it ; and that it take immediate 
steps not only to put the country in a more thorough state of defense 
but also to exert all its power and employ all its resources to bring the 
Government of the German Empire to terms and end the war. ... It 
will involve the utmost practicable cooperation in counsel and action with 
the Governments now at war with Germany. . . . 

"We have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling 
towards them but one of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon 
their impulse that their Government acted in entering this war. It was 
not with their previous knowledge or approval. It was a war determined 
upon as wars used to be determined upon in the old unhappy days when 
peoples were nowhere consulted by their rulers, and wars were provoked 
and waged in the interest of dynasties or of little groups of ambitious 
men who were accustomed to use their fellow men as pawns and tools. 
Self-governed nations do not fill their neighbor States with spies or set the 
course of intrigue to bring about some critical posture of affairs which will 
give them an opportunity to strike and make conquest. Such designs 
can be successfully worked out only under cover and where no one hiis 
the right to -ask questions. Cunningly contrived plans of deception or 
aggression, carried, it may be, from generation to generation, can be 
worked out and kept from the light only within the privacy of courts or 
behind the carefully guarded confidences of a narrow and privileged class. 
They are happily impossible where public opinion commands and insists 
upon full information concerning all the nation's affairs. 

"A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a 
partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic Government could be 
trusted to keep faith within it or to observe its covenants. It must be a 
league of honor, a partnership of opinion. Intrigue would eat its vitals 
away ; the plottings of inner circles who could plan what they would and 
render account to no one would be a corruption seated at its very heart. 
Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honor steady to a com- 
mon end and prefer the interests of mankind to any narrow interest of 
their own. . . . 

"... The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be 
planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty. We have no 
selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no 
indemnities for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices 
we shall freely make. We are but one of the champions of the rights of 
mankind. We shall be satisfied when those rights have been made as 
secure as the faith and the freedom of nations can make them. . . . 

"... We shall, happily, still have an opportunity to prove that 
friendship [for the German people] in our daily attitude and actions 
towards the millions of men and women of German birth and native 
sympathy who live amongst us and share our life, and we shall be proud 



'70 THE GREAT WAR 

to prove it towards all who are in fact loyal to their neighbors and to the 
Government in the hour of test. They are, most of them, as true and loyal 
Americans as if they had never known any other fealty or allegiance. They 
will be prompt to stand with us in rebuking and restraining the few who 
may be of a different mind and purpose. If there should be disloyalty, it 
will be dealt with with a firm hand of stern repression ; but if it lifts its 
head at all, it will lift it only here and there and without countenance 
except from a lawless and malignant few." — (Speech to the Senate, 
April 2, 1917.) 

7. Declaration of a state of war with Germany. Passed in the Senate (April 4) 

by a vote of 32 to 6 ; in the House (April 6), 373 to 50.— (See War Cyclo- 
pedia, under 'War, Declaration Against Germany.') 

"Whereas, The Imperial German Government has committed repeated 
acts of war against the Government and the people of the United St .tes 
of America : Therefore be it 

"Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United 
States of America in Congress assembled, That the state of war between the 
United States and the Imperial German Government which has thus 
been thrust upon the United States is hereby formally declared ; and that 
the President be, and he is hereby, authorized and directed to employ 
the entire naval and military forces of the United States and the resources 
of the Government to carry on war against the Imperial German Govern- 
ment ; and to bring the conflict to a successful termination all the resources 
of the country are hereby pledged by the Congress of the United States." 
■ — (Joint Resolution of Congress, approved by the President, April 6, 
1917.) 

8. Declaration of War against Austria-Hungary (December 7, 1917). Passed 

unanimously in the Senate, and with one opposing vote (Meyer London, 
Socialist, from New York City, voting "present") in the House. — (See 
War Cyclopedia, under 'Austria-Hungary, Break With,' 'Dumba, Recall 
of/ 'War, Declaration against Austria-Hungary,' etc.) 

III. Summary of Our Reasons for Entering the War 

1. Because of the renewal by Germany of her submarine warfare in a more 

violent form than ever before, contrary to the assurance given to our 
Government in the spring of 1916. This resulted in the loss of additional 
American lives and property on the high seas and produced in the minds 
of the President and Congress the conviction that national interest and 
national honor required us to take up the gauntlet which Germany had 
thrown down. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Submarine Warfare, Am- 
erican Lives Lost,' etc.) 

2. Because of the conviction, unwillingly reached, that the Imperial German 

Government had repudiated wholesale the commonly accepted principles 
of law and humanity, and was "running amuck" as an international 
desperado, who could be made to respect law and right only by forcible 
and violent means. The cumulative effect of Germany's outrages should 



UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR 71 

be noted in this connection. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'German 
Diplomacy,' 'German Government, Moral Bankruptcy of.') 

3. Because of the conviction that Prussian militarism and autocracy, let 

loose in the world, disturbed the balance of power and threatened to 
destroy the international equilibrium. They were a menace to all nations 
save those allied with Germany; and the menace must be overthrown, 
as Napoleonism had been at the beginning of the nineteenth century, by a 
coalition of the States whose honor, rights, and national existence were 
endangered. The Middle-Europe project should receive attention in this 
connection. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Autocracy,' 'Hegemony,' 
'Kaiserism,' ' Mittel-Europa,' 'Prussianism,' etc.) 

4. Because of the gradual shaping of the conflict into a war between demo- 

cratic nations on the one hand and autocratic nations on the other, and 
because of the conviction that, as our nation in Lincoln's day could not 
hope to long endure "half slave and half free," so the world community 
of today could not continue to exist part autocratic and part 
democratic. Note the effect of the Russian Revolution on the issues in 
the war. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Russian Revolution of 1917'.) 

5. Because of the conviction that our traditional policy of isolation and aloof- 

ness was outgrown and outworn, and could no longer be maintained in the 
face of the growing interdependence which is one of the leading character- 
istics of this modern age. — (See War Cyclopedia, 'United States, Isola- 
tion.') 

6. Because of the menace to the Monroe Doctrine and to our own indepen- 

dence. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'America Threatened,' 'Monroe 
Doctrine, German Attitude.' 

"The history, the character, the avowed principles of action, the 
manifest and undisguised purposes of the German autocracy, made it clear 
and certain that if America stayed out of the Great War, and Germany 
won, America would forthwith be required to defend herself, and would be 
, unable to defend herself against the same lust for conquest, the same will 
to dominate the world which has made Europe a bloody shambles.' 

" . . . If we had stayed out of the war, and Germany had won, we 
should have had to defend the Monroe Doctrine by force or abandon it ; 
and if we abandoned it, there would have been a German naval base in the 
Caribbean commanding the Panama Canal, depriving us of that strategic 
line which unites our eastern and western coasts, and depriving us of the 
protection which the expanse of ocean once gave. And an America 
unable or unwilling to protect herself against the establishment of a Ger- 
man naval base in the Carribean would lie at the mercy of Germany, 
subject to Germany's orders. America's independence would be gone 
unless she was ready to fight for it, and her security would thenceforth 
be, not a security of freedom, but only a security purchased by sub- 
mission." — (Ex-Senator Root, speech in Chicago, September 14, 1917.) 



72 THE GREAT WAR 

IV. Duty of All Citizens to Support the War Whole-Heartedly 

' ' A nation -which declares war and goes on discussing whether it ought 
to have declared war or hot is impotent, paralyzed, imbecile, and earns 
the contempt of mankind and the certainty of humiliating defeat and 
subjection to foreign control. A democracy which cannot accept its own 
decisions made in accordance with its own laws, but must keep on end- 
lessly discussing the questions already decided, has failed in the funda- 
mental requirements of self-government; and, if the decision is to make 
war, the failure to exhibit capacity for self-government by action will 
inevitably result in the loss of the right of self-government. Before the 
decision of a proposal to make war, men may range themselves upon 
one side or the other of the question ; but after the decision in favor of 
war the country has ranged itself, and the only issue left for the individual 
citizen to decide is whether he is for or against his country. From that 
time on, arguments against the war in which the country is engaged are 
enemy arguments. Their spirit is the spirit of rebellion against the 
Government and laws of the United States. Their effect is to hinder and 
lessen that popular support of the Government in carrying on the war 
which is necessary to success. Their manifest purpose is to prevent 
action by continuing discussion. They encourage the enemy. They tend 
to introduce delay and irresolution into our own councils. The men who 
are today speaking and writing and printing arguments against the war, 
and against everything which is being done to carry on the war, are 
rendering more effective service to Germany than they ever could render 
in the fields with arms in their hands. The purpose and effect of what they 
are doing is so plain that it is impossible to resist the conclusion that the 
greater part of them are at heart traitors to the United States, and willfully 
seeking to bring about the triumph of Germany and the humiliation 
and defeat of their own country. 

"The same principles apply to the decision of numerous questions which 
arise in carrying on the war [such as conscription, sending troops to France, 
etc.]. . . ." — (Ex-Senator Root, speech at Chicago, September 14, 1917.) 



V. Reading References 

American Year Book, 1914, 1915, 1916, 1917 (under International 

Relations). 
Beck, J. M. The War and Humanity, chs. ii-vi. 
Bui lard, A. Mobilizing America. 

Cheradame, A. The United States and Pan-Germania. 
Fess, S. D. The Problems of Neutrality When the World is at War. 

(64 Cong. Doc, No. 2111.) 
Gerard, J. W. My Four Years in Berlin, chs. xviii-xix. 
How the War Came to America. (Committee on Public Information.) 
Ogg, F. A. National Progress, 1907-1917. (American Nation Series.) 
Ohlinger, G. Their True Faith and Allegiance. 
Osborne, W. F. America at War. 



UNITED STATES ENTERS THE WAR 73 

Partial Record of Alien Enemy Activities, 1915-1917. (Pamphlet re- 
printed from data prepared by the Providence Journal, by the National 
Americanization Committee, 29 West 39th St!, New York.) 

Rathom, J. R. Germany's Plots Exposed. (World's Work for Feb- 
ruary, 1918.') 

Robinson, E. E., and West,V. J. The Foreign Policy of Woodrow Wilson. 

Rogers, L. America's Case Against Germany. 

Scott, J. B. A Survey of International Relations between the United 
States and Germany, August 1, 1914- April 6, 1917. 

Sperry, E. E. German Plots and Intrigues (Committee on Public In- 
formation publication, in press). 

Wilson, Woodrow. Speeches in publications of the Committee on Public 
Information (How the War Came to America ; The War Message and 
the Facts Behind It ; The President's Flag Day Address, with Evid- 
ence of Germany's Plans ; Labor and the War ; War, Labor, and Peace, 
etc.). See also volume published by Review of Reviews Company, 
entitled President Wilson's State Papers and Addresses. C. Gauss, 
Democracy Today; etc. 

For official statements from the War Department, Navy Department, 
Shipping Board, and Treasury Department as to what we accomplished 
in the first year of our participation in the war, see a review published by 
the Committee on Public Information through the daily papers April 
7, 1918. 



IX. COURSE OF THE WAR, 1914-18 
I. Campaign of 1914 

1. Germany's general plan of action : First crush France, then Russia, then 

Great Britain. The German plan in its earlier stages was like a timetable, 
with each step scheduled by day and hour. 

2. On the Western Front : 

(a) Belgium overrun (August 4-20). Resistance of Liege, Namur, etc., 
overcome by giant artillery (42-centimeter guns) ; but the delay 
(of ten days) gave the French time to mobilize and threw the German 
plans out of gear. Liege occupied, August 7; Brussels, August 20; 
Namur, August 22 ; Lou vain burned, August 26. 

"Every minute in it [the German plan] was determined. From the 
German frontier, opposite Aix-la-Chapelle, to the gap of the Oise, on 
the French frontier . . . there are six days' march. But the passage 
of the Germans across Belgium in arms halted before Liege and before 
Namur, halted on the edge of the Gette, beaten on August 12 on the edge 
of the forest of Haelen, victorious on August 18 and 19 at Aerschot — ■ 
had lasted sixteen days (August 4-20) . The splendid effort of the Belgians 
had therefore made ten full days late the arrival of the German armies 
on the French frontier, from which only eight marches separated them 
from the advanced forts of Paris." — (Joseph Reinach, in N. Y. Times 
Current History, September, 1917, p. 495.) 

(b) Invasion of France. Advance of Germans in five armies through 
Belgium and Luxemburg ; General von Moltke, chief of staff ; Gen- 
erals von Kluck, von Buelow, etc. Wary tactics of the French 
under General Joffre; arrival of the British expeditionary force 
(100,000 men) under General French (August 8-21) ; Battle of Mons- 
Charleroi (August 21-23) ; dogged withdrawal of the French and 
British from Belgium to the line of the River Marne, while a new 
French army (the Sixth) was being formed. — Advance of the Ger- 
mans to within twenty miles of Paris; then sudden swerve to the 
east away from Paris. 

(c) Battle of the Marne (September 6-10). The opposing forces in 
contact from Paris to Verdun, a front of one hundred and eighty 
miles. French attempt to turn the German west flank. German 
armies forced to retreat from the Marne to the River Aisne, where 
they entrenched. 

The battle of the Marne was "one more decisive battle of the world, 
... for Europe conceivably the greatest in permanent meaning since 
Waterloo. In that battle it has been decided that Europe should still 
be European and not Prussian. At the Marne, France had saved herself 

74 



COURSE OF THE WAR 75 

and Europe." — (F. H. Simonds, in American Review of Reviews, for 
February, 1915, page 179.) 

(d) Failure of the Allies (September 12-17) to break through the German 
line in the Battle of the Aisne. Extension of the trench system from 
Switzerland to the North Sea (fall of Antwerp, October 8). Import- 
ance of German conquest of Belgian coast as supplying bases for her 
later submarine warfare. 

The battle line established after the Battle of the Aisne remained 
practically stationary, with some slight swaying backward and forward, 
for the next three years. The parts of France held by the Germans 
included ninety per cent of her iron ore, eighty per cent of her iron and 
steel manufactures, and fifty per cent of her coal resources. 

(e) Battle of the River Yser (October 16-28); Belgians cut their dykes. 
First battle of Ypres (October 22-November 15); Prussian Guards 
defeated by the "contemptible little army" of Great Britain. Failure 
of the Germans to reach Calais, their objective. German losses on 
Yser and at Ypres, 150,000. 

2. On the Eastern Front : 

(a) First Russian invasion of East Prussia (August 18). The resulting 
necessity of withdrawing German troops from the West front helped 
to produce the German check on the Marne. One Russian army, 
advancing from Warsaw, was crushed in the Battle of Tamienberg 
(August 26-September 1) ; called by German writers "the greatest 
battle of destruction in history." A second army, advancing from 
Kovno, was disastrously defeated in the Battle of the Mazurian 
Lakes (September 6-10, at same time with Battle of the Marne). 
East Prussia cleared of the Russians ; General Hindenburg thence- 
forth the idol of Germany. 

(b) Russian invasion of Galicia. Breakdown of the Austrian resistance. 
Capture of Tarnapol, Halicz, and Lemberg (August 27-September 
3) ; Jaroslav (November 5) ; siege of Przemysl (surrendered March 
22, 1915) ; invasion of Hungary threatened. 

(c) German invasion of Russian Poland fails. Three offensives of Ger- 
man armies against Warsaw beaten off (November-December). 
Narrow escape of a German army from disaster in the Battle of Lodz 
(November 19, December 3). 

(d) Thanks to the relaxation of Austrian pressure, due to the foregoing 
events, Serbia expelled the Austrian invaders from her territory 
(December 14). 

3. Loss of Germany's colonies. New Guinea, Bismarck Archipelago, etc., 

taken by the Australians (September). Tsingtau (November 7) and 
various Pacific islands captured by the Japanese. British conquest of 
Togoland (August 26) ; German Southwest Africa (July 15, 1915) ; 
Kamerun (February 16, 1916) ; British invasion of German East Africa 
begun (conquest completed in December, 1917). — Failure of De Wet's 
German-aided rebellion in South Africa owing to loyalty of the Boers 
(October-December, 1914). — Pro-Turkish Khedive of Egypt deposed, 



76 THE GREAT WAR 

British protectorate proclaimed, and a new ruler set up with title of 
Sultan (December 17, 1914). 

4. Turkey openly joins the Teutonic Allies (October 29). Defeat of Turks 

by Russians in the Caucasian region (January, 1915). Failure of Turkish 
attempts to invade Egypt (February 3, 1915). Revolt of the "holy 
places" in Arabia against Turkish rule and establishment of the King- 
dom of Hejaz there (June 27, 1916). ' 

5. Naval War. Great importance in the war of British naval preponderance, 

aided by early concentration in the North Sea. British naval victory 
in Helgoland Bight (August 28). Three British cruisers torpedoed by 
submarines in the North Sea (September 21). German naval victory in 
the Pacific off coast of Chile (November 1). German cruiser Emden 
caught and destroyed at Cocos Island after sensational career (November 
10). British naval victory off Falkland islands (December 8) avenges 
defeat of November 1. German fleet driven from the seas. Disappear- 
ance of German shipping. Freedom of action for British transport of 
East Indian, New Zealand, Australian, and Canadian troops, etc., to 
Europe, and of Allied commerce, except for the (as yet slight) sub- 
marine danger. Error of Great Britain in failing to declare at once a 
rigid blockade of Germany. 

6. Situation at close of 1914 : On western front, defeat of the plan of the 

German General Staff ; on eastern front, Teutonic forces held in check ; 
Germany and Austria as yet cut off from their new ally, Turkey. On the 
whole the advantage was on the side of the Entente Allies. But the Allied 
commanders (General Joffre, Lord Kitchener, and Grand Duke Nicholas) 
failed fully to grasp the needs of the situation. "Each of these leaders 
believed that the height of military efficiency had been reached in the 
past campaigns"; in the great development of barrier fire and the ex- 
cellence of the French "75 's." The Teutonic allies, on the other hand, 
"were making colossal preparations of artillery and munitions which 
were destined to change the year 1915 into a tragedy for -the Entente 
Allies." — (T. C. Frothingham, in Neio York Times Current History, 
September, 1917, p. 422.) 

II. Campaign of 1915 

1. On the West Front. Failure of the Allied offensive in Champagne (March- 

April) ; Battle of Neuve Chapelle. Second Battle of Ypres (April 22-26) ; 
Germans first use poison gas ; heroism of the Canadians. Inadequacy of 
Allies' preparations for carrying the formidable German entrenchments. 
Desultory fighting through the summer. Failure of the second offensive 
in Champagne and Flanders (September) . General French superseded by 
General Haig as British commander-in-chief. 

2. The Gallipoli Expedition. Failure of Allies to force the Dardanelles with 

their fleets alone (February- March). Troops landed after long delay, 
in April and August. Abandonment of expedition in December- January, 



COURSE OF THE WAR 77 

after enormous losses. Disastrous effects on the hesitating nations, 
Bulgaria and Greece. Bitter controversy in Great Britain over the 
question of responsibility for this fiasco. 

3. Second Russian invasion of East Prussia (January-February) crushed by 

Hindenburg in the Mazurian lake region (February 4-12). 

4. Terrific drive of combined Germans and Austrians under Hindenburg and 

Mackensen in Poland and Galicia (April- August) . Decisive battle on the 
Dunajec River (May 2) ; fall of Przemysl (June 2) ; Lemberg (June 22) ; 
Warsaw (August 5). All Poland conquered ; Courland overrun. Russian 
losses, 1,200,000 killed and wounded; 900,000 captured; 65,000 square 
miles of territory. Russian line established from Riga to Eastern Galicia. 
Grand Duke Nicholas removed from chief command and sent to command 
in the Caucasus (September 8) . 

5. Bulgaria joins the Teutonic Allies (October 13). Serbia crushed by simul- 

taneous invasions of Austro-Germans and Bulgarians (completed 
December 2). Montenegro conquered (January, 1916). — Landing of an 
Anglo-French army at Saloniki prevented King Constantine of Greece 
from openly joining the Teutonic alliance. 

6. Italy declares war on Austria (May 23) to recover the regions about Trent 

(the "Trentino") and Trieste. Lack of military results on Italian front 
in 1915 (failure to capture Gorizia). War on Germany not declared until 
August 27, 1916. 

7. Naval War. In a battle in the North Sea (January 24) a British patrolling 

squadron defeated a German raiding squadron. Increasing use of sub- 
marines by Germany. German proclamation of "a war zone" about the 
British Isles (in force February 18) established a so-called "blockade" 
of Great Britain, — Deliberately planned sinking of the passenger steam- 
ship Lusitania (May 7) with loss of 1198 lives (124 Americans). 

8. Increase in Allies' munitions supply arranged for; appointment (May, 

1915) of Lloyd George to be British Minister of Munitions. Failure of 
Zeppelin raids over England to produce expected results. (Between 
January 19, 1915, and October 1, 1917, German aircraft, including 
Zeppelins, raided England thirty -four times, killing outright 865 men, 
women, and children, and wounding over 2,500.) 

9. Summary : The situation at the end of 1915 was much less favorable for 

the Entente than at the beginning of the year. Little change on Western 
front. Great changes on Eastern front — Russians driven from Russian 
Poland and Austrian Galicia ; Hungary saved from invasion ; Central 
Powers finked to Turkey by the adhesion of Bulgaria and the conquest of 
Serbia. "The Teutons were no longer hemmed in; they had raised the 
siege." 

III. Campaign of 1916 

1. Battle of Verdun ("no longer a fortress but a series of trenches".) Great 
German attack under the Crown Prince (February-July) ; defeated by 



78 THE GREAT WAR 

the heroic resistance of the French under General Petain ("They shall not 
pass"). Enormous German losses (about 500,000 men) through attacks 
in close formation against French fortifications defended by "barrage" 
fire and machine guns. Practically all ground lost was slowly regained 
by the French in the autumn. "Verdun was the grave of Germany's 
claim to military invincibility." — (Col. A. M. Murray, "Fortnightly" 
History of the War, I, 368.) — Hindenburg made commander-in-chief of 
the German forces, August 29. Lord Kitchener drowned, June 5. 

2. Battle of the Somme (July 1-November). The strengthened artillery of 

the Allies enabled them to drive back the Germans on a front of twenty 
miles, and to a depth of nine. Estimated loss to Germans, 700,000 men ; 
German estimate of French and British loss, 800,000. The Allies failed to 
break through the German lines. 

3. Galician and Armenian Fronts. Great Russian offensive (June-Septem- 

ber) under General Brusilov, on front from Pripet marshes to Bukovinian 
border. Capture of Czernovitz (June 18). Hundreds of thousands of 
Austrians taken prisoneES. — Suceessful offensive of Grand Duke Nicholas 
in Armenia against the Turks ; capture of Erzerum (February 16) and 
Trebizond (April 18). 

4. Roumania enters the war and is crushed. Encouraged by Allied successes 

and treacherously urged, it is claimed, by the Russian Court, Roumania 
declared war (August 27) with a view to rescuing her kindred populations 
from Austro-Hungarian rule. Unsupported invasion of Transylvania; 
terrific counter attacks by German-Austrian-Bulgarian armies under 
Generals Mackensen and Falkenhayn ; Roumanians driven from Trans3 r l- 
vania. Greater part of Roumania conquered (fall of Bucharest, December 
6) . Rich wheatfields and oil lands gained by Teutons, and the "corridor " 
to Constantinople widened. The "Mittel-Europa" project approaches 
realization. 

5. British reverse in Mesopotamia. Basra, on Persian Gulf, taken by British 

November 31, 1914; advance of General Townshend's inadequate ex- 
pedition from India up the Tigris River toward Bagdad ; expedition 
besieged by Turks at Kut-el-Amara (January- April, 1916) ; relieving ex- 
pedition forced to turn back. Surrender of General Townshend (April 29) 
with 13,000 men. Serious blow to British prestige in the East. (The 
report of an investigating commission, June 26, 1917, divides the re- 
sponsibility for failure between the Home Government and the Govern- 
ment in India.) 

6. Italian Front. Successful Austrian offensive from the Trentino (May 16- 

June 3). Brusilov's drive in Galicia, however, relieved the pressure upon 
the Italians, who then (August 6th to September) freed Italian soil of the 
Austrians, and began an offensive which brought them Gorizia on the 
River Isonzo (August 9) and carried them to within thirteen miles of 
Trieste. 

7. Naval War. In the Battle of Jutland (May 31) the British battle-cruiser 

fleet engaged the German high-seas fleet until darkness enabled the Ger- 



COURSE OF THE WAR 79 

man ships to escape the on-coming British dreadnaughts . Heavy loss 
on both sides ; the British loss apparently the greater ; both sides claim 
the victory. — Increased use of submarines by Germans. Channel packet 
Sussex sunk (March 25) without warning, in violation of German pledge. 

Political events in Great Britain affecting the war. Adoption of compulsory 
military service (May 25) lays the basis for a British army of 5,000,000 
men. Sinn Fein rebellion in Dublin (Ireland) crushed (April 25-28) ; Sir 
Roger Casement convicted of treason and executed (August 2). Lloyd 
George displaces Asquith as head of British cabinet, to infuse new energy 
into the war (December 5-7) . 

Summary : The balance in 1916 inclined on the whole in favor of the Allies — ■ 
at Verdun, on the Somme, in Galicia, in Italy, and on the sea. Against 
these victories must be set the disasters in Roumania and Mesopotamia. 
The Central Powers continued to possess the advantage of operating on 
interior lines, enabling them while adopting a defensive attitude on certain 
fronts to concentrate for a drive elsewhere ; also they retained their 
superiority (though diminished) in strategy, tactics, and material equip- 
ment. 



IV. Campaign of 1917 

Unrestricted submarine warfare begun by Germany (February 1). Hun- 
dreds of thousands of tons of belligerent and neutral shipping sunk each 
month. (Merchant shipping destroyed by mines and submarines from 
the outbreak of the war to January 1, 1917, was 5,034,000 tons; from 
January to June, 1917, the total was 3,856,000 tons ; for the whole year, 
1917, approximately 6,623,000 tons.) On February 5, 1918, it was officially 
stated that 14,120 non-combatant British men, women, and children had 
been done to death by German submarines . Reliance upon this weapon 
by Germany to starve Great Britain out ; failure of the policy to achieve 
the ends planned. — (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Shipping, Losses,' 
'Spurlos Versenkt Applied,' 'Submarine Blockade,' 'Submarine War- 
fare,' etc.) ' 

Entrance of the United States into the War. War declared on Germany, 
April 6 ; on Austria-Hungarjr, December 7. (See chapter viii.) Energetic 
measures to raise, and transport, an army of one and a half million men, 
and to provide food, munitions, and shipping for ourselves and our 
associates. Magnitude of this task prevented the full weight of the United 
States being felt in 1917. Nevertheless, over 250,000 American troops 
were in France under General Pershing by December. — (See War Cyclo- 
pedia, under 'Austria-Hungary, Break With,' 'United States, Break 
with Germany,' 'War, Declaration Against Austria-Hungary,' 'War, 
Declaration Against Germany' ; also under 'Acts of Congress,' 'Alien 
Enemies,' 'Army,' 'Bond Acts,' 'Cantonments,' 'Espionage Act,' 
'Food and Fuel Control Act,' 'Profiteering,' 'Red Cross,' 'Selective 
Service,' 'Shipping Board,' 'War Industries Board,' 'Y. M. C. A.', etc.) 



80 THE GREAT WAR 

3. Further Spread of the War. Cuba and Panama follow the United States 

in declaring war on Germany (April 7). King Constantine of Greece 
deposed (June 12, 1917) and Greece joined the Allies (June 28). Siam 
declared war on Germany, July 22; Liberia, August 4 ; China, August 14. 
Brazil repealed its declaration of neutrality and severed diplomatic re- 
lations; war declared October 26. The following broke diplomatic re- 
lations with Germany without declaring war: Bolivia (April 14), Guate- 
mala (April 27), Honduras (May 17), Nicaragua (May 18), Haiti (June 
17), Costa Rica (September 21), Peru (October 6), Uruguay (October 7), 
Ecquador (December 8) . German destruction of South American vessels 
and revelations of the abuse by her diplomats of Argentine neutrality 
under cover of Swedish diplomatic immunity (the Luxburg dispatches; 
"spurlos versenkt"), led to widespread agitations for war with Germany 
and united action of all the South American countries. 

4. Western Front. Withdrawal of German forces on a front of fifty miles to 

new and more defensible positions (the "Hindenburg line") extending 
from Arras to Soissons (March) ; wanton wasting of the country evacu- 
ated. Battle of Arras (April 9-May) brought slight gains to the Allies; 
a mine of 1 ,000,000 pounds of high explosives was fired at Messines 
(July 7). Terrific offensive in Battle of Flanders (July-December) won 
Passchendaele ridge and other gains. Battle of Cambrai (November 20- 
December) begun by ' 'tanks " without artillery preparation ; Hindenburg 
line penetrated and Germans forced to retire on front of twenty miles, 
to depth of several miles. Violent German counter-attacks forced partial 
retirement of British (from Bourlon wood, etc.). — Interallied War Council 
formed (November). 

5. Italian Front. Great Italian offensive begun in the Isonzo area (Carso 

Plateau) in May. When the Russian Revolution permitted the with- 
drawal of Austrian troops to the Italian front, a new Austro-German 
counter-drive was begun (October-December) which undid the work of 
two years. Northeastern Italy invaded ; 280,000 men and thousands of 
guns captured. Italians make a stand on the Piave and Brenta Rivers 
(Asiago Plateau) . French and British aid checked further enemy advance 
in 1917. 

6. Bagdad captured by a new British expedition (March 11). Restoration of 

British prestige in the East. Cooperation of Russian and British forces 
in Asia Minor and Persia. — British advance from Egypt into Palestine 
in March ; Ascalon and Jaffa taken (November) ;, Jerusalem surrendered to 
British (December 9, 1917). 

7. Revolution in Russia. Due to pro-German policy of certain members of 

the Russian court and the well founded suspicion that a separate peace 
with Germany was planned. Abdication of the Tsar, March 19. Power 
seized from Constitutional Democrats by moderate socialists and radicals 
(Council of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates) ; formation of a govern- 
ment under Alexander Kerensky (July 22). Military power of Russia 
paralyzed by weakening of discipline through creation of hierarchy of 
6oldiers' councils even at the front ; frequent refusals of soldiers to obey 



COURSE OF THE WAR 81 

orders; hundreds of officers murdered; "fraternizing" of the armies en- 
couraged by German agents. — Germans seized Riga (September 3), 
and the islands at entrance to Gulf of Riga (October 13-15), thus 
threatening Petrograd. — General Kornilov failed in an attempt to seize 
power with a view to restoring order and prosecuting the war (September.) 
— Overthrow of Kerensky (November 6-7) by extreme socialists (Bolshe- 
viki), who repudiated Russia's obligations to the Allies, and negotiated 
a separate armistice with Germany with a view to immediate peace 
(December 15). (See War Cyclopedia, under 'Kerensky,' 'Lenine,' 
'Russian Revolution,' etc.) 

8. Summary : Ruthless submarining imparts a more desperate character to 
the conflict, but brings Germany and her allies no nearer ultimate victory. 
Against her submarine successes, the Austro-German gains in Italy, 
and the Russian collapse, must be set, the British victories in Mesopo- 
tamia and Palestine, the Allied gains on the Western Front, and the en- 
trance of the United States with its vast potential resources into the war. 



V. Campaign of 1918 (to April 3) 

1. Break-up of Russia. Finland, Lithuania, Ukrainia, Bessarabia, Bokhara, 

Khiva, the Crimea, Armenia, Siberia, etc., declare their independence. 
Civil wars, political and social chaos, economic disorganization, terrible 
suffering and crime. 

"It is the separate nationalities, of which there are more than forty 
drawn under Russian dominion, that are today breaking away from 
Revolutionary Russia, and organizing independent local governments, in 
defiance of Bolsheviki rule." — -(Asia, March, 1918, p. 185.) 

2. Republic of Ukrainia (supported by the middle class) signs peace with 

the Central Powers February 9. (See chapter x.) 

3. Peace signed between the Central Powers and the Bolsheviki Government 

of Russia, March 3. (See chapter x.) German lines in the West 
enormously strengthened by the transfer (in spite of agreements to the 
contrary) of men and munitions from the East front. 

4. Spring drive of the Central Powers in France between Arras and La Fere 

(region of the former battles of the Somme and of Cambrai); "the greatest 
and most momentous battle in the history of the world" (Lloyd George) . 
In thirteen days (March 21-April 3) by terrific massed attacks the Ger- 
mans drove back the British and French a distance of some 35 miles 
on a front of 60 miles, wiping out the gains of 1916 and 1917. Trench 
warfare gave place to fighting in the open. Bombardment of Paris by 
a "mystery gun" from a distance of 70 miles. Unity of command of the 
Allies obtained by appointment of General Ferdinand Foch (joint hero 
with Joffre at the battle of the Marne, and "the greatest strategist in 
France") to the supreme command of the Allied forces. General 
Pershing's 100,000 Americans offered to Foch and accepted. By April 3 
a lull had come, while both sides brought up forces for a renewal of the 
struggle. 



82 THE GREAT WAR 

VI. Reading References 

For maps and map references, see History Teacher's Magazine, for 
April, 1918. 

Anon. A German Deserter's War Experience (1917). 

Allen, G. H., and Whitehead, H. C. The Great War. (2 vols, issued.) 

Belloc, H. A General Sketch of the European War. (2 vols, issued.) 

Buchan, J. Nelson's History of the War. (Several volumes issued.) 

Boyd, W. With the Field Ambulance at Ypres (1916). 

Brittain, H. E. To Verdun from the Somme, 1916. 

Cobb, I. S. Paths of Glory (1915). 

Doyle, A. Conan. A History of the Great War. (2 vols issued.) 

Eye-Witness's Narrative of the War : From the Marne to Neuve Chapelle 

(1915). 
Fortescue, G. At the Front with Three Armies (1914). 
Gibbs, P. The Soul of the War (1915). 

. The Battle of the Somme (1917). 

Hay, Ian. The First Hundred Thousand. 
Kennedy, J. M. The Campaign Around Liege (1914). 
The [London] Times' History of the War (serial, weekly). 
Masefield, J. Gallipoli. 

N. Y. Times Current History (serial, monthly). 
Olgin, M. J. The Soul of the Russian Revolution (1918). 
Palmer, F. My Year of the War. 

. My Second Year of the War. 

Powell, E. A. Italy at War (1917). 

Reed, J. The War in Eastern Europe. 

Ruhl, A. Antwerp to Gallipoli (1916). 

Sarolea, C. How Belgium Saved Europe, viii-xviii. 

Simonds, F. History of the Great War (several volumes issued). 

Verhaeren, E. Belgium's Agony. 

Washburn, S. The Russian Advance (1917). 

Wells, H. G. Italy, France, and Great Britain at War (1917). 



X. PROPOSALS FOR PEACE : WILL THIS BE THE LAST WAR? 
I. Summary of the 23 States at War in 1917 

1. The Teutonic Allies: Austria-Hungary, Germany, Turkey (1914); Bul- 

garia (1915). 

2. The Entente Allies: Serbia, Russia, France, Belgium, Great Britain, 

Montenegro, Japan (1914) ; Italy, San Marino (1915) ; Portugal, Rou- 
mania (1916) ; United States, Cuba, Panama, Greece, Liberia, Siam, 
China, Brazil (1917). In addition, Bolivia, Guatemala, Honduras, 
Nicaragua, Haiti, Costa Rica, Peru, Uruguay, and Ecuador severed 
diplomatic relations with Germany (1917) without declaring war. 

H. American Aims in the War 

(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Aims of the United States,' 'Permanent 
Peace, American Plans,' 'United States, Isolation of,' 'War Aims of 
the United States.') 

1. Vindication of our national rights. "We enter the war only where we are 

clearly forced into it, because there is no other means of defending our 
rights." Hence war not declared at first against Austria-Hungary, 
Turkey, andBulgaria. 

2. Vindication of the rights of Humanity. "Our motive will not be revenge 

or the victorious assertion of the physical might of the nation, but only 
the vindication of right, of human right. . . . Our object ... is to 
vindicate the principles of peace and justice in the life of the world as 
against selfish and autocratic power." 

3. Making the world safe for Liberty and Democracy. "We are glad ... to 

fight thus for the ultimate peace of the world and the rights of nations 
great and small and the privilege of men everywhere to choose their way 
of life and obedience. The world must be made safe for democracy. Its 
peace must be planted upon the tested foundation of political liberty." — 
(The above quotations are from President Wilson's speech to Congress, 
on April 2, 1917.) tf 

4. German system of intrigue and force must be crushed. "This intolerable 

thing of which the masters of Germany have shown us the ugly face — 
this menace of combined intrigue and force which we now see so clearly 
as the German power, a thing without conscience or honor or capacity 
for covenanted peace, must be crushed, and if it be not utterly brought to 
an end, at least shut out from the friendly intercourse of the nations." — ■ 
(President Wilson, address of December 4, 1917.) 

5. Reparation of wrongs done by Germany. ' 'Our present and immediate 

task is to win the war, and nothing shall turn us aside from it until 
it is accomplished. . . . We shall regard the war as won only when the 
German people say to us, through properly accredited representatives, 

83 



84 THE GREAT WAR 

that they are ready to agree to a settlement based upon justice and the 
reparation of the wrongs their rulers have done." — (President Wilson, 
address of December 4, 1917.) 

6. Creation of an improved international system including a permanent League 

or Concert of Powers to preserve international peace. — (See President 
Wilson's speeches of January 22 and April 2, 1917, and January 8, 1918.) 

7. Absence of selfish designs. "We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire 

no conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no 
material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make. We are but 
one of the champions of the rights of mankind. We shall be satisfied when 
these rights have been made as secure as the faith and the freedom of 
nations can make them." — (President Wilson, speech of April 2, 1917.) 

HI. Various. Peace Proposals 

(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Lansdowne Note,' 'Peace Overtures, 
German, 1916,' 'Peace Overtures, Papal,' 'Peace Terms, American,' 
'No Annexations, no Indemnities,' etc.) 

1. Offer of Germany and her allies (December 12, 1916) to meet their enemies 

in a peace conference (see "Official Documents Looking toward Peace" 
in International Conciliation for January, 1917). An empty and insincere 
proposal. They "propose to enter forthwith into peace negotiations," but 
refuse to state any terms ; on the other hand much is made of the ' ' glorious 
deeds of our armies" and their "incomparable strength." The proposal 
evidently looked to a "German peace," with Germany and her allies 
triumphant. 

Reply of the Entente Allies (December 30, 1916). The German pro- 
posal was styled "less an offer of peace than a war maneuver. It is 
founded on calculated misinterpretation of the character of the struggle in 
the past, the present, and the future. . . . Once again the Allies declare 
that no peace is possible so long as they have not secured reparation for 
violated rights and liberties, the recognition of the principle of nationality 
and the free existence of small States, so long as they have not brought 
about a settlement calculated to end once and for all forces which have 
constituted a perpetual menace to the nations, and to afford the only 
effective guarantee for the future security of the world." — (International 
Conciliation for January, 1917, pp. 27-29.) 

2. President Wilson's effort (December 20, 1916) to elicit peace terms from the 

belligerents (see his note in International Conciliation, for February, 
1917): 

(a) Germany merely repeats its proposal of December 12, still refusing 
to go into details in advance of a formal conference. — (Ibid., p. 7.) 

(b) The Allies' reply (January 10, 1917). Their statement of terms in- 
cluded adequate compensation for Belgium, Serbia, and Monte- 
negro ; evacuation of invaded territories of France, Russia, and 
Roumania; reorganization of Europe on the basis of nationality; 
the ending of Turkish rule in Europe, etc. 



PROPOSALS FOR PEACE 85 

"It goes without saying that if the Allies wish to liberate Europe from 
the brutal covetousness of Prussian militarism, it never has been their 
design, as has been alleged, to encompass the extermination of the Ger- 
man peoples, and their political disappearance." — (Ibid., pp. 8-10.) 

Widespread and intense desire for peace among the German people.. 
Evidenced, among other things by the following declaration of the Reichs*- 
tag on July 19, 1917 (following sudden alliance of Center or Catholic 
party with the Socialists) : 

"As on August 4, 1914, so on the threshold of the fourth year of the 
war the German people stand upon the assurance of the speech from the 
throne — 'We are driven by no lust of conquest.' 

"Germany took up arms in defense of its liberty and independence and 
for the integrity of its territories. The Reichstag labors for peace and a 
mutual understanding and lasting reconciliation among the nations. 
Forced acquisitions of territory and political, economic, and financial 
violations are incompatible with such a peace. 

"The Reichstag rejects all plans aiming at an economic blockade and 
the stirring up of enmity among the peoples after the war. The freedom 
of the seas must be assured. Only an economic peace can prepare the 
ground for the friendly association of the peoples. 

' ' The Reichstag will energetically promote the creation of international 
juridical organizations. So long, however, as the enemy Governments 
do not accept such a peace, so long as they threaten Germany and her 
allies with conquest and violation, the German people will stand together 
as one man, hold out unshaken, and fight until the rights of itself and its 
allies to life and development are secured. The German nation united is 
unconquerable. 

"The Reichstag knows that in this announcement it is at one with the 
men who are defending the Fatherland. In their heroic struggles they 
are sure of the undying thanks of the whole people." — (N. Y. Times 
Current History, VI, p. 195.) 

The day following the adoption of the above declaration, Chancellor 
von Bethmann Hollweg resigned office. This apparently was due to 
the fact that he had forfeited the confidence of the Emperor and the 
military party, rather than to the fact that he was out-voted in the 
Reichstag. 

It should be noted that the Reichstag has no power to conclude peace, 
or to initiate peace negotiations, or even to force the German Govern- 
ment to do so, except by refusing further credits. 

Pope Benedict XV attempts to promote Peace. 

(a) His first appeal (August, 1915) lacked definite proposals and wa s 
without effect. 

(b) His second appeal (August 1, 1917) recommended: (1) "That the 
material force of arms shall give way to the moral force of right " ; 
simultaneous and reciprocal decrease of armaments ; the establishing 



86 THE GREAT WAR 

of compulsory arbitration "under sanctions to be determined against 
any State which would decline either to refer international questions 
to arbitration or to accept its awards." (2) True freedom and com- 
munity of the seas. (3) Entire and. reciprocal giving up of in- 
demnities to cover the damages and cost of the war; (4) Occupied 
territory to be reciprocally given up; guarantees of Belgium's 
political, military, and economic independence ; similar restitutions 
of the German colonies. (5) Territorial questions between Italy and 
Austria, and France and Germany, to be taken up after the war "in a 
conciliatory spirit, taking into account, as far as it is just and possible 
. . . the aspirations of the population." Questions of Armenia, 
the Balkan States, and the old Kingdom of Poland to be dealt with 
in the same way. — (N. Y. Times Current History, September, 
1917, pp. 392-393.) 

In the main this was a proposal for the restoration of the status 
quo ante helium, the conditions existing before the war. 

5. Reply of the United States to the Pope's appeal (August 27, 1917). The 

Entente Allies practically accepted this reply as their own. 

"To deal with such a power by way of peace upon the plan proposed 
by his Holiness the Pope would, so far as we can see, involve a recupera- 
tion of its strength and a renewal of its policy; would make it necessary 
to create a permanent hostile combination of nations against the German 
people, who are its instruments ; and would result in abandoning the new- 
born Russia to the intrigue, the manifold subtle interference, and the 
certain counter-revolution which would be attempted by all the malign 
influences to which the German Government has of late accustomed the 
world. Can peace be based upon a restitution of its power or upon any 
word of honor it could pledge in a treaty of settlement and accommodation ? 

"... We believe that the intolerable wrongs done in this war by the 
furious and brutal power of the Imperial German Government ought to be 
repaired, but not at the expense of the sovereignty of any people — ■ 
rather a vindication of the sovereignty both of those that are weak and of 
those that are strong. Punitive damages, the dismemberment of empires, 
the establishment of selfish and exclusive economic leagues, we deem 
inexpedient and in the end worse than futile, no proper basis for a peace 
of any kind, least of all for an enduring peace. That must be based upon 
justness and fairness and the common rights of mankind. 

"We cannot take the word of the present rulers of Germany as a 
guaranty of anything that is to endure, unless explicitly supported by such 
conclusive evidence of the will and purpose of the German people them- 
selves as the other peoples of the world would be justified in accepting. 
Without such guaranties, treaties of settlement, agreements for dis- 
armament, covenants to set up arbitration in the place of force, territorial 
adjustments, reconstitution of small nations, if made with the German 
Government, no man, no nation could now depend on." — (War, Labor, 
and Peace, pp. 4-6.) 

6. Reply of Germany (September 22, 1917). This was filled with the vaguest 



PROPOSALS FOR PEACE 87 

generalities. In part it consisted of hypocritical and lying protestations 
that ever since the Kaiser ascended the throne he had ' ' regarded it as his 
principal and most sacred task to preserve the blessings of peace for the 
German people and the world " ; and that "in the crisis which led up to the 
present world conflagration his Majesty's efforts were up to the last 
moment directed towards settling the conflict by peaceful means." 
With reference to the substituting of "the moral power of right" for 
"the material power of arms," and for the reduction of armaments and 
the establishing of arbitration, indorsement was given the Pope's pro- 
posals in such vague and general terms as not to bind the German Gov- 
ernment to anything. 

No notice whatever was taken of the Pope's plea for the giving up of 
occupied territory and the restoration of Belgium's independence. When 
reports were published in the German press that nevertheless the 
Government was prepared to give up Belgium, Chancellor Michaelis 
denied this, saying (September 28) : 

"I declare that the Imperial Government's hands are free for eventual 
peace negotiations. This also refers to Belgium." 

7. Failure of the attempt to promote an international conference of Socialists 

at Stockholm (Sweden) for peace on the basis of the Russian revolutionary 
formula, "No annexations and no indemnities," September, 1917. 
This failure was due to (a) suspicion that pro-German influence was back 
of the proposal; and (b) publication of proofs of pro-German and un- 
neutral conduct on the part of Swedish diplomatic officials. — (See War 
Cyclopedia, under 'Spurlos Versenkt,' 'Stockholm Conference,' 'Sweden, 
Neutral Problems.') 

January 28-February 3, 1918, occured a widespread strike in Germany 
(500,000 said to have struck in Berlin alone) to secure (a) a general 
peace " without indemnities or annexations," (b) betterment of food and 
living conditions, and (c) more democratic political institutions. The 
arrest of the leaders and the firm attitude of the military authorities 
speedily sent the strikers back to work. 

8. President Wilson's proposals of January 8, 1918: 

"What we demand in this war ... is nothing peculiar to ourselves. 
It is that the world be made fit and safe to live in ; and particularly that 
it be made safe for every peace-loving nation which, like our own, wishes 
to five its own life, determine its own institutions, be assured of justice 
and fair dealing by the other peoples of the world as against force and 
selfish aggression. All the peoples of the world are, in effect, partners in 
this interest, and for our own part we see very clearly that unless justice 
be done to others it will not be done to us. The program of the world's 
peace, therefore, is our program ; and that program, the only possible 
program, as we see it, is this : 

"I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall 
be no private international understandings of any kind, but diplomacy 
shall proceed always frankly and in the public view. 



88 THE GREAT WAR 

"II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial 
waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in- 
whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of interna- 
tional covenants. 

"III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the 
establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations 
consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance. 

"IV. Adequate guaranties given and taken that national armaments 
will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety. 

"V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all 
colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in 
determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the popula- 
tions concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the 
Government whose title is to be determined. 

"VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory, and such a settlement of 
all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest cooperation 
of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and 
unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her 
own political development and national policy, and assure her of a sincere 
welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own 
choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that 
she. may need and may herself desire. The treatment accorded Russia 
by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their 
good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their 
own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy. 

"VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and 
restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys 
in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as 
this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which 
they have themselves set and determined for the government of their 
relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure 
and validity of international law is forever impaired. 

"VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions 
restored; and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter 
of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly 
fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made 
secure in the interest of all.* 

"IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected 
along clearly recognizable lines of nationality. 

"X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations 
we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest 
opportunity of autonomous development. 

"XI. Roumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; 

*"If France gets back Alsace-Lorraine, the production of iron ore in Germany would be 
7,471,638 tons and in France 42,850,265. Should Germany keep the Briey Basin [in 
Northern France] which she now holds, the production in Germany would be 41,307,143 
tons, and in France 9,014,76 tons." — (S. S. McClure, Obstacles to Peace, p. 113.) 



PROPOSALS FOR PEACE 89 

occupied territories restored ; Serbia accorded free and secure access to 
the spa ; and the relations of the several Balkan States to one another 
determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of 
allegiance and nationality; and international guaranties of the political 
and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan 
States should be entered into. 

"XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should 
be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are 
now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life 
and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, 
and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to 
the ships and commerce of all nations under international guaranties. 

"XIII. An independent Polish State should be erected which should 
include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, 
which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose 
political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be 
guarantied by international covenant. 

"XIV. A general association of nations must be formed, under specific 
covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guaranties of political 
independence and territorial integrity to great and small States alike." — 
(War, Labor, and Peace, pp. 28-31.) 

On February 11 the President made this further statement : 

"After all, the test of whether it is possible for either Government 
[Austria or United States] to go any further in this comparison of views 
is simple and obvious. The principles to be applied are these : 

"First, that each part of the final settlement must be based upon the 
essential justice of that particular case and upon such adjustments as 
are most likely to bring a peace that will be permanent ; 

"Second, that peoples and provinces are not to be bartered about from 
sovereignty to sovereignty as if they were mere chattels and pawns in a 
game, even the great game, now forever discredited, of the balance of 
power ; but that 

"Third, every territorial settlement involved in this war must be made 
in the interest and for the benefit of the populations concerned and not as 
a part of any mere adjustment or compromise of claims amongst rival 
States ; and 

"Fourth, that all well-defined national aspirations shall be accorded the 
utmost satisfaction that can be accorded them without introducing new or 
perpetuating old elements of discord and antagonism that would be likely 
in time to break the peace of Europe and consequently of the world." 
— [War, Labor, and Peace, p. 38.) 

The proposals of Great Britain (speech of Lloyd George, January 5, 
1918) and of. revolutionary Russia (Bolshevik proposals at Brest-Li to vsk, 
December 2, 1917) were in substantial agreement with those of President 
Wilson. — (See comparative synopsis in N.Y. Times Current History 
for February, 1918, pp. 257-9.) 



90 THE GREAT WAR 

An Inter-Allied Labor Conference, held in London February 20-23, 
speaking in the name of practically all the organized working class of 
Great Britain, France, Belgium, and Italy, specifically indorsed' President 
Wilson's proposals, and declared that "a victory for German imperialism 
would be the defeat of democracy and liberty in Europe,'" and that the 
Socialists whom they represented "were inflexibly resolved to fight until 
victory is achieved."— (Full text of declaration in The New Revublic for 
March 23, 1918.) 

10. Replies of Germany and Austria (January 24) : 

Count Czernin, the Austrian Foreign Minister, replied to President 
Wilson's address of January 8, in a speech of conciliatory tone, but said 
that Austria would "defend the pre-war possessions of her allies as she 
would her own." This attitude ignored the Alsace-Lorraine question, but 
by implication conceded the giving up of Belgium. (In the first tele- 
graphic despatches, this passage was falsified in the German interest by 
the Wolff Press Bureau.) 

Chancellor von Hertling's speech in reply was "very vague and con- 
fusing " : 

"His discussion and acceptance of our general principles lead him to 
no practical conclusions. He refuses to apply them to the substantive 
items which must constitute the body of any final settlement. He is 
jealous of international action and of international counsel. He accepts, 
he says, the principle of public diplomacy, but he appears to insist that 
it be confined, at any rate in this case, to generalities; and that the several 
particular questions of territory and sovereignty, the several questions 
upon whose settlement must depend the acceptance of peace by the 
twenty-three States now engaged in the war, must be discussed and 
settled, not in general council, but severally by the nations most im- 
mediately concerned by interest or neighborhood. 

"He agrees that the seas should be free, but looks askance at any 
limitation to that freedom by international action in the interest of the 
common order. He would without reserve be glad to see economic 
barriers removed between nation and nation, for that could in no way 
impede the ambitions of the military party with whom he seems con- 
strained to keep on terms. Neither does he raise objection to a limitation 
of armaments. That matter will be settled of itself, he thinks, by the 
economic conditions which must follow the war. But the German 
colonies, he demands, must be returned without debate. He will discuss 
with no one but the representatives of Russia what disposition shall 
be made of the peoples and the lands of the Baltic Provinces; with no 
one but the Government of France the ' conditions ' under which French 
territory shall be evacuated ; and only with Austria what shall be done 
with Poland. In the determination of all questions affecting the Balkan 
States he defers, as I understand him, to Austria and Turkey; and with 
regard to the agreements to be entered into concerning the non-Turkish 
peoples of the present Ottoman Empire, to the Turkish authorities 
themselves. After a settlement all around, effected in this fashion, by in- 



PROPOSALS FOR PEACE 91 

dividual barter and concession, he would have no objection, if I correctly 
interpret his statement, to a league of nations which would undertake 
to hold the new balance of power steady against external disturbance. 
"It must be evident to everyone who understands what this war has 
wrought in the opinion and temper of the world that no general peace, 
no peace worth the infinite sacrifices of these years of tragical suffering, 
can possibly be arrived at in any such fashion. The method the German 
Chancellor proposes is the method of the Congress of Vienna. We cannot 
and will not return to that. What is at stake now is the peace of the world. 
What we are striving for is a new international order based upon broad 
and universal principles of right and justice — no mere peace of shreds and 
patches." — (President Wilson, address of February 11, 1918, in War, 
Labor, and Peace, pp. 34-5.) 

11. Attitude of the Kaiser. 

"The year 1917 with its great battles has proved that the German 
people has in the Lord of Creation above an unconditional and avowed 
ally on whom it can absolutely rely. ... If the enemy does not want 
peace, then we must bring peace to the world by battering in with the 
iron fist and shining sword the doors of those who will not have peace." — 
(Address to German Second Army on the French front, December 22, 
1917.) 

"We desire to live in friendship with neighboring peoples, but the 
victory of German arms must first be recognized. Our troops under the 
great Hindenburg will continue to win it. Then peace will come." — (On 
conclusion of peace with Ukrainia, February 11, 1918.) 

"The prize of victory must not and will not fail us. No soft peace, 
but one corresponding with Germany's interests." — (To Schleswig- 
Holstein Provincial Council, March 20, 1918.) 

IV. Dealings of the Central Powers with Russia and Roumania 

1. Armistice with Russia for one month agreed to December 15, 1917 (sub- 

sequently extended to February 18, 1918). 

2. Brest-Litovsk negotiations (December 22-February 10). 

(a) Count Czernin presented (December 25) what purported to be the 
terms of the Central Powers for a general peace, "without forcible 
annexation of territory" or indemnities. "Almost any scheme of 
conquest could be perpetrated within the literal interpretation of 
such a pledge." — (Lloyd George, January 5, 1918.) 

(b) Failure of Russia's allies to appear at Brest-Litovsk within ten days 
led the German representatives to declare Czernin 's terms with- 
drawn. Negotiations with Russia for a separate peace followed. 

(c) Quarrels between the Russian and German negotiators over (1) the 
German refusal to guaranty an immediate removal, after the peace, 
of German troops from occupied Poland, Lithuania, Courland, 



92 THE GREAT WAR 

Livonia, and Esthonia; and (2) over Bolshevik propaganda for 
revolution in Germany. (3) Reported conflicts between the German 
Foreign Minister von Kuehlmann and the German military party; 
victory of the militarists and determination to annex extensive 
portions of Russian territory. 

3. Peace concluded (February 9) between the Central Powers and the "anti- 

Bolshevik party in Ukrainia, which had set up a weak "people's re- 
public." Tts purpose to secure grain for the Teutonic allies from the 
rich "black lands" of Ukrainia, to control its extensive coal and iron 
deposits, and to rule the Black Sea. Refusal of the Bolsheviki to recog- 
nize the new State; civil war in Ukrainia, resulting in conquest by German 
troops and the occupation of Odessa (March 13). Similar civil war and 
German occupation in Finland; Aaland Islands seized by Germany. 

4. Abrupt withdrawal of the Bolshevik negotiators from Brest-Litovsk and 

announcement that the war was at an end, without signing a treaty of 
peace (February 10): 

"We could not sign a peace which would bring with it sadness, op- 
pression and suffering to millions of workmen and peasants. But we 
also cannot, will not, and must not continue a war begun by czars and 
capitalists in alliance with czars and capitalists. We will not and we 
must not continue to be at war with the Germans and Austrians — work- 
men and peasants like ourselves. . . . Russia, for its part, declares the 
present war with Germany and Austria-Hungary, Turkey and Bulgaria 
at an end. Simultaneously, the Russian troops receive an order for 
complete demobilization on all fronts." — (Declaration signed by Lenine 
and Trotzky, heads of the Bolshevik Government of Russia.) 

5. Renewal of German military operations against Russia (February 18) 

with the object of adding Esthonia and Livonia, the remaining Baltic 
Provinces, to other lands wrested from Russia. 

6. Announcement by Lenine and Trotzky (February 19) that "in the present 

circumstances" their Government was forced "formally to declare its 
willingness to sign a peace upon the conditions which had been dictated" 
by the Central Powers at Brest-Litovsk. The Germans nevertheless 
advanced, with practically no resistance, on a front of 500 miles and to 
within seventy miles of Petrograd. Great quantities of military supplies 
captured (over 1,300 cannon, 4,000 to 5,000 motor cars, etc.) 

7. Peace between Russia and the Central Powers signed at Brest-Litovsk 

(March 3, 1918; ratified by the "All-Russian Congress of Soviets," at 
Moscow, March 14). Its principal terms were: (a) the surrender by 
Russia of Courland, Poland, Lithuania, Livonia, and Esthonia. (b) 
Peace to be made with Ukrainia and Finland by which Russia recognizes 
their independence, (c) Batoum and other districts in Transcaucasia to 
be surrendered to Turkey, (d) An indemnity which is variously esti- 
mated at from $1,500,000,000 to $4,000,000,000. 

Maxim Gorky calculated that this treaty robbed Russia of 4 per 
cent of her total area, 26 per cent of her population, 27 per cent of her 
agricultural land normally cultivated, 37 per cent of her foodstuffs pro- 



PROPOSALS FOR PEACE 93 

duction, 26 per cent of her railways, 33 per cent of her manufacturing 
industries, 75 per cent of her coal, and 73 per cent of her iron. It has 
also been pointed out that the treaty strengthened Germany's hold on the 
Mohammedan peoples, and gave her an alternative route to India and 
the East via Odessa, Batoum, Transcaucasia, and northern Persia. 
8. Roumania was forced to sign a preliminary treaty with the Central Powers 
(March 6), ceding the whole of the Dobrudja and granting extensive 
trading and other rights. Subsequently (March 9) Roumania broke off 
negotiations owing to excessive demands. Austria then (March 21) 
added to her claims the surrender of about 3,000 square miles of terri- 
tory on Roumania's western frontier. 

Control of vast petroleum fields in Roumania and Transcaucasia, as 
well as extensive and rich wheat lands, was obtained by the Central 
Powers through these treaties. 

IV. Will This Be the Last Great War? 

(See War Cyclopedia, under 'Arbitration,' 'Hague Tribunal,' 'Inter- 
national Law, Sanction of,' 'League to Enforce Peace,' 'Peace Treaties, 
'Permanent Peace,' etc.) 

1. Conflict vs. mutual aid as factors in evolution. Are States of necessity rival 

and conflicting organizations? 

2. William James' answer to the militarists' plea for war as a school to develop 

character and heroism ; the existence of a "moral equivalent for war." — ■ 
(See International Conciliation for February, 1910.) 

3. Amicable means of settling international differences. These include 

negotiation, good offices, mediation, international commissions .of in- 
quiry, and international arbitration. (See A. S. Hershey, Essentials of 
International Law, ch. xxi.). About 600 cases of international arbi- 
tration have been listed since 1800. Importance of developing the habit 
of relying on these amicable means of settling differences. 

4. Proposals of the League to Enforce Peace. These include the following 

articles, to be signed by the nations joining the League : 

"(lj All justiciable questions arising between the signatory Powers, 
not settled by negotiation, shall, subject to the limitations of treaties, 
be submitted to a Judicial Tribunal for hearing and judgment, both upon 
the merits and upon any issue as to its jurisdiction of the question. 

" (2) All other questions arising between the signatories, and not settled 
by negotiation, shall be submitted to a Council of Conciliation for hearing, 
consideration, and recommendation. 

"(3) The signatory Powers shall jointly use forthwith both their eco- 
nomic and military forces against any one of their number that goes to 
war, or commits acts of hostility, against another of the signatories before 
any question arising shall be submitted as provided in the foregoing. 

"The following interpretation of Article 3 has been authorized by the 
Executive Committee ; ' The signatory Powers shall jointly use, forthwith, 



94 . THE GREAT WAR 

their economic forces against any of their number that refuses to submit 
any question which arises to an international Judicial Tribunal or Council 
of Conciliation before threatening war. They shall follow this by the joint 
use of their military forces against that nation if it actually proceeds to 
make war or invades another's territory without first submitting, or offer- 
ing to submit, its grievance to the court or Council aforesaid and awaiting 
its conclusion.' 

" (4) Conferences between the signatory Powers shall be held from time 
to time to formulate and codify rules of international law, which, unless 
some signatory shall signify its dissent within a stated period, shall 
thereafter govern in the decisions of the Judicial Tribunal mentioned in 
Article I." — (World Peace Foundation, Pamphlet Series, August, 1916.) 

5. Possibility of World Federation. 

(a) Some historical antecedents — the Holy Alliance (1815) ; the Quad- 
ruple, later the Quintuple, Alliance (1815) ; the Hague Peace Con- 
ferences (1899 and 1907) ; the Conference at Algeciras (1906). 

(b) Success of partial federations — the United States of America; 
Dominion of Canada, Commonwealth of Australia, and Union of 
South Africa; the British Empire; the German Empire; etc. 

(c) Lack of explicitness in current proposals. "Internationalists hold 
that nationalism is no longer expressive of the age, but that federa- 
tion is not as yet feasible ; that the present sovereignty of States is 
detrimental, but that one cannot hope to change the theory suddenly. 
Hence, they propose internationalism, that is, a sort of confederation, 
a cooperative union of sovereign States, a true Concert of Powers. 
The individual schemes vary greatly and are usually not very explicit, 
chief emphasis being placed on faults of the present system." — 
(Edward Kriehbiel, Natio?ialism, War, and Society, page 210.) 

6. Indispensable elements in an effective World Federation. 

(a) The triumph of democratic government. "A steadfast concert for 
peace can never be maintained except by partnership of democratic 
nations. No autocratic government could be trusted to keep faith 
with it or observe its covenants. . . . Only free peoples can hold 
their purpose and their honor steady to a common end and prefer 
the interests of mankind to any narrow interest of their own." — ■ 
(President Wilson, speech of April 2, 1917.) 

(b) An international legislature. We have already the beginnings of a 
world legislature in the two Hague Conferences of 1899 and 1907. 

(c) An international executive authority and an international army and 
navy. 

(d) An international court of justice. The so-called permanent court of 
arbitration at the Hague (Hague Tribunal) not a real court. 

7. The triumph of the United States and the Entente Allies over militarist 

and despotic Germany gives the best assurance of the establishment of a 
League of Peace and the practical ending of war- 



PROPOSALS FOR PEACE 95 

V. Reading References 
Babson, R. W. The Future of World Peace. 
Buxton, C. R. (editor). Toward a Lasting Peace (1915). 
Cheradame, A. Pan-Germany, The Disease and Cure. (Reprinted from 

Atlantic Monthly, November and December, 1917.) 

. The United States and Panger mania, chs. iv-vii. 

"Cosmos," The Basis of a Durable Peace (1917). 

Grumbach, S., and Barker, J. E. Germany's Annexationist Aims 

(abridgement in English of Grumbach's Das Annexionistische 

Deutschland) . 
Hedlam, J. W. The Issue (1917). 

Herron, G. D. Woodrow Wilson and the World's Peace (1917). 
Hill, E.J. The Rebuilding of Europe. 
Marcosson, I. L. The War after the War. 
Toynbee, J. A. The New Europe (1916). 

Webb , 'Sidney . When Peace Comes ; the Way of Industrial Reconstruction . 
Wilson, President. Addresses (as in chapter viii). 



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